


Mama Parr

by PikaPals16



Category: Six - Marlow/Moss
Genre: Alternate Universe - Foster Family, Family Fluff, Foster Care AU, Found Family, Gen, How Do I Tag, Hurt/Comfort, and grace helps, cathy takes care of all the queens and ladies, i used the alternates cuz i didn't wanna have oc's, tw's are in chapters specifically
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-03
Updated: 2021-02-12
Packaged: 2021-03-08 01:20:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 15
Words: 47,648
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26717401
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PikaPals16/pseuds/PikaPals16
Summary: Cathy never thought she'd be a foster parent of 9.That's it, that's the summary
Relationships: Catherine Parr & Ladies, Catherine Parr & Queens
Comments: 157
Kudos: 128





	1. How Does One Become A Foster Parent?

**Author's Note:**

> OK disclaimer, i don't know how the system actually works, i'm going off of what i already know (plus what i've seen in other fics whoops)
> 
> Inspired by this picture (credit goes to artist): https://www.instagram.com/p/CB5FQPGjPd0/

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cathy and Grace decide to become foster parents.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (for reference, the colors for vicki, courtney, and grace are the same as their alternate costumes (u know, like we all do for the queens) so vicki is teal, courtney is orange, and grace wears black.)

Here she is. Catherine Parr. In her room. In her house. That was passed down to her by her grandparents. That she shares with her best friend Grace. That is a lot bigger than the two of them need, but their other friends refuse to move in because they 'don't want to be a bother'. A load of shit if you ask Cathy.

But she isn't going to force them into anything. She's not that type of person. She _is_ the type of person who would totally not be surprised if they showed up randomly at her door.

The brunette hears the doorbell and (rather reluctantly) parts with her writing to go answer it. As she makes her way downstairs and to the front door, she peeks through the peephole of the door to find two very familiar faces.

"Hey Cathy! Sorry we came by on such short notice." Vicki remarks as Cathy opens the door. The girl in blue steps aside to let her friends walk inside the house.

"It's not like you don't do it every single day." Grace retorts from the kitchen, causing Vicki to roll her eyes. "You're lucky I even cook enough for you all." The group laughs at this.

"But in all fairness, we haven't seen you girls around here for a bit, what's gotten you so busy?"

"Yeah, things have been getting a little busy since Collette."

"Who's Collette?" Grace asks, having finished lunch and is now silently motioning for everyone to come to the table. As they walk, Courtney answers the hanging question.

"Collette's our foster child. We were gonna surprise you girls but _Vicki_ ," Courtney gives her roommate a look. "seemed to have _other_ plans." The queens, as they like to call themselves, sit down at the table, starting to partake in the prepared food as Cathy asks another question.

"The two of you are foster parents? Don't you have to be dating or something to be foster parents together?"

"Courtney, you better not have broken up with Eloise." Grace threatens, causing Courtney to panic for a second.

"No, no, we're still dating don't worry." The girl in orange assures, taking a moment to recollect herself before redirecting the topic. "Yes, we decided to try fostering, and we're foster parents now. Surprisingly, you don't have to be in a relationship with the other to foster a child together. You just have to be willing to share the responsibility."

"Isn't it hard?" The girl in black questions further.

"Any type of parenting is hard, Grace." Vicki is the one who answers. "But, once a sense of trust is established between you and your foster child, it's an amazing thing really. Collette is just, the sweetest. Hey, you two should start fostering." Cathy can hear Courtney's scolding, but doesn't pay attention to it as she's lost in her own thoughts.

She's heard stories about foster parents and families. On one hand, she's heard it's as easy as raising a child born into your family. On another, she's heard about the whiplash, some kids being too much for the foster parent to handle--too much as in extremely violent.

But overall, it _is_ a good cause. Giving the kids a safe place with food, water, a bed, other necessities. Especially when they're transitioning out of an unfortunate situation. Yes, it _would_ be hard to gain the child's trust, but that's when patience would go into play.

Cathy can subtly hear the conversation shifting, and turns her attention back to it. She can think about it later.

* * *

The blue girl brings up the topic with her housemate in the evening, long after Vicki and Courtney left.

"Hey Grace, I've been thinking about what Vicki suggested earlier." Cathy starts off, expecting the girl in black to not remember what she's talking about. Not necessarily agree with her.

"Actually, I have too." The answer shocks the brunette, as she doesn't associate the black-haired girl with parenting. "Cathy, if you want to do it, I'll help you out."

"Really?" Grace nods. Cathy pauses for a second, thinking over the decision again. After about two minutes, Cathy takes out her phone and texts Courtney.

 **cravingcoffee:** hey court

 **cravingcoffee:** wat exactly would i have to do to become a foster parent?


	2. Lina

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cathy and Grace get their first foster child. Meet, Lina!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw: death, abandonment, attempted kidnapping?
> 
> p.s. it's f i n a l l y u p l o a d e d, thank god!

The process to becoming foster parents takes about three months, and it's now the middle of May. All Cathy and Grace need to do is wait for the call.

They just didn't expect it to come in the middle of a Friday night, early Saturday morning if you want to be exact.

At the sound of her ringtone, Cathy groans awake. She just fell asleep 10 minutes ago, and now someone's calling her? Just what are the odds? However, as the writer sees who the call is from, she sits upright in bed, answering it immediately.

"Lucy? Something wrong?" Lucy is the social worker who helped them through their training. She's also the one who said she'd call if something came up. However, Grace and Cathy hadn't had the chance to ask what she'd meant by that, so they have no idea what's in store for them.

"Hey Cathy, sorry for calling you this late..." As Lucy talks, Cathy gets up and put on a bra before walking towards Grace's room. God knows the girl hates being woken up, but if Lucy's calling--especially at this hour--she's got to hear it as well. "But there's a child here at the agency, could you two come on over ASAP?" 

Cathy has no idea why there'd be a child at the agency at this hour, doesn't this type of stuff happen during the day? Unless, it's an emergency. She can't pinpoint any hint of worry or panic in Lucy's voice, but perhaps she's learned how to stay calm in these situations.

"Of course, I'll wake up Grace and we'll be there as soon as we can." The girl on the other line thanks Cathy before hanging up, allowing the blue girl to formally, and swiftly, knock on Grace's door. She doesn't wait for an answer though, bursting in and briskly walking to her housemate's bed. "Grace! Wake up!"

"Cathy why the fuck are you up? It's 3 in the morning!" Grace groans, turning towards the brunette but not bothering to open her eyes. Cathy doesn't have time for this.

"It's 3:12 actually, but that doesn't matter. Lucy called. She needs us ASAP." With that, the girl in black rubs her eyes open and starts rolling out of bed.

"Start the car, I'll be down in a minute. You're driving." On normal circumstances, Cathy would've argued against driving, but these are not normal circumstances. The older of the two (only by a couple of months, Grace would say) obeys the younger, slipping on a hoodie before going outside to start the car. Grace comes down within a minute as she previously said, and the two start driving.

A million thoughts are racing through Cathy's head as she drives as fast as the speed limit allows her to. She tries her best to focus on her task, but one thought seems to be more prominent then the others.

What happened to the kid?

(・_・ ) (・_・ ) (・_・ )

What does she remember? She remembers falling asleep in her bed. She remembers Isabela and Joanna tucking her in for once, instead of just telling her to go to sleep. She remembers the dream she had of mother and father, John and Maria... She doesn't want to think about the dream.

What else? She remembers waking up on the sidewalk. And the men... She doesn't want to think about the men either. Then she started running and the girl with two hair colors found her. She likes the girl's blonde and brown hair. But she wouldn't do that to her hair.

Now she's inside, with a blanket. Instead of outside. She wonders if her sisters are going to come and get her. She wants to go home. But she has a strange feeling that they won't. And that scares her.

But she wouldn't be surprised.

(・_・ ) (・_・ ) (・_・ )

There's minimal conversation during the drive, mostly Cathy filling Grace in on the very vague phone call she received. The black-haired girl is as confused as she's concerned. It's extremely vague, but that makes it concerning because no one's that vague unless it's big.

As they arrive, both girls exit the car and enter the building as quick as they can. Once they get inside, they easily find Lucy, who's facial expression differs a lot from her tone on the phone.

"Oh, thank god you two are here. Follow me." Grace resists the urge to make some snarky remark. She's still not content with the whole 'waking up at 3 am' situation, she's tired as hell. As the three walk, Lucy (finally) explains what heck is going on. "Apologies again for calling so late. I found this girl running away from something when I went out for a walk." Grace wants to ask why she was taking a walk at 3 am, but decides against it. "She had no idea where she was or how she got there, so we have a case going on right now."

Cathy flinches a bit. She didn't know that foster parents had to get involved in cases as well. If it was in their training, she forgot it.

"So, why call us?" Grace asks, her tone slightly bitter due to the current lack of sleep.

"Sorry about her, she hates being woken up." Cathy apologizes, which surprisingly results in a little chuckle from the social worker.

"No worries. Basically, I was hoping the two of you would be ok with taking her home and maybe fostering her? We can't keep her here, and based on past experience, it'd be nice to help her through everything. Of course, this is based on majority of cases, like you were reminded in training, every child is different-"

"Lucy." Grace gently presses, causing Lucy to stop herself. "We'd be happy to take her." A sigh of relief is released from the blonde/brunette. "Do you know her name and age?"

"Her name is Catalina Aragon. She hasn't told me anything else. In here." Lucy opens the door and stands to the side to make room for the new foster parents. Cathy and Grace stand in the doorway for a couple of seconds, not wanting to frighten the girl, and taking in the sight.

Catalina has a blue blanket wrapped around her shoulders, her hands gripped tightly around it, fingers fidgeting with it. Her expression is a bit sad, if anything besides emotionless. Her eyes are trained to the floor, clear tear stains on her face. There are various bruises that she's tried to hide with either the blanket or her clothes, but some are too far away to be hidden.

The black and blue duo are taken aback by the sight. Neither of them have been in this type of situation before, nothing even relatively close. They don't exactly know what to do. But, they want to try. For her sake.

Cathy leads the way inside, slowly approaching the child and kneeling down a fair distance away from her. Grace follows her friend's lead, taking a seat to Cathy's left. The writer breaks the silence, her voice barely a whisper. 

"Hey. I'm Cathy. And this is my best friend Grace." Grace doesn't say anything, just waves and smiles at the young girl. "Lucy over there, the girl who brought you here, told us your name was Catalina, right?"

"Yeah." Lina doesn't know why these two are talking to her, but they seem nice. It's not like she hasn't been following strangers all night.

"How old are you?" The girl in black tries to make small conversation before they have to tell her why they're _actually_ there.

"Seven." Both new foster parents feel extremely sorry for Catalina. No one deserves to go through, whatever she went through, but Catalina's only seven, barely into school. Who knows how hard she's taking it.

The older of the adults makes note of the one-word answers that the girl's giving them. She won't want to talk about what happened now, so they should focus on getting her home and asleep.

"That's a pretty good age to be."

"Not really." Cathy tries to come up with a transition towards them having to take Catalina home. She's clearly closed off and would probably be skeptical about going with two strangers to their home. But it's past 3, and Cathy put her writing mind to rest. She can't think of any.

"Ok, Catalina, I can't think of a way to ease you into this, so I'm just going to tell you, alright?" The girl nods. "Ok. Lucy can't find any of your family members at the moment, and she can't keep you here. So she asked us to bring you to our house, ok? We're going to be taking care of you until we find them. Is that alright with you?"

Oh. Catalina knows what this is. She's not all too fond of the idea, but as much as she wants to go home, all she can think about is how tired she is.

"My sisters take care of me. So I'm not going into foster care." Grace and Cathy are relieved that she's no longer giving one-word answers, but are shocked that the seven year old knows what the system is. Based on their experience, most kids don't find out it exists unless they're put into it, or until they're about in 6th grade.

"Listen Catalina, we don't know if you are or not, they're still trying to find your family. What I know, and I'm sure Cathy knows, is that you'll have to stay with us for now, we'll probably find your family within a couple days, and it's probably 4 at this point, I'm tired, and I just want to go to sleep."

That puts a small smile on Catalina's face. She likes how Cathy and Grace tell her everything instead of leaving out stuff like everyone else does. But as quickly as it appears, it's gone, and her expression once again is almost emotionless.

"Estoy realmente muy cansada..." Cathy mutters to herself, thinking no one will hear her. Catalina flinches for a bit, thinking the Spanish comes her mother, before sadly realizing it was this other woman who she has to go home with later.

"¿Hablas español tambien?" The currently quiet girl asks. Spanish was her first language, having been born in Spain before moving to England with her family. Cathy's eyes flicker with shock at the fluent Spanish coming from Catalina's mouth. Something she can connect with.

"Sí, mis padres me enseñaron." Catalina doesn't know how to feel about Cathy's Spanish. She likes being able to talk in it, but it reminds her of her mother. She doesn't want to go back to it. Doesn't wanna think about it. If she thinks about it, she'll feel sad and bad. And older people don't like that.

So she just nods. Because if she doesn't say anything, it'll be okay.

As much as Grace loves the fact that the two are bonding, she is 1: feeling a tiny bit left out. And 2: tired as hell. She clears her throat, reminding the two Spanish speakers that they should probably be heading home now.

"We should head home now." Cathy chuckles a bit embarrassingly at the slight reminder (both that they need to go home, and that Grace doesn't speak Spanish).

With that, the trio bids their farewells to Lucy and walks towards the car. When the vehicle opens, Catalina tugs on Cathy's sleeve, silently asking her to sit in the back. She doesn't understand why she's trusting these two so much. She didn't trust these types of people before. What's so different about them?

She followed them without hesitation to their car. She asked one of them to sit with her, which, she's never asked _anyone_ to sit with her. So, why now? Why them?

Cathy smiles and sits next to Catalina, Grace seeing the interaction and sits in the driver's seat. As they drive, Catalina notices how Cathy and Grace don't force anything. Grace doesn't push her to answer questions from the driver's seat, and Cathy doesn't try and touch her without permission.

She thought all older people forced kids into doing stuff.

Sitting in the car makes the child's eyes heavy, and soon, she falls asleep, her body unknowingly leaning on the adult next to her. Cathy wraps her arm around the sleeping girl, stabilizing her and making sure she doesn't wake up.

Arriving at the house, Grace opens the doors for Cathy, who's decided on carrying Catalina inside instead of waking her up. The blue girl brings the child up to what the adults of the house have called the gold room.

Cathy's grandparents apparently have assigned each room a color or two, and that's what the decor and such is inspired by. Why? No one has any idea. Child Cathy never really questioned it, and she can't ask them now. It _is_ pretty cool though.

The writer gently lays Catalina down onto the bed, tucking her into the covers before tip-toeing out of the room. She exits just in time to meet her best friend face to face.

"She still good?" Grace asks.

"Yeah. Do you think those bruises are alright?"

"I don't know, we'll have to check later." Both of them let out a yawn, Grace's being a lot bigger as she _doesn't_ pull all-nighters. "I'm going to sleep. And I will not wake up until lunch time." Cathy chuckles at this.

"Alright. Don't count on me making food though."

"I am never letting you in the kitchen again." The retort is automatic, as this is one of their many friendly banters. "Rest well, Cathy."

"Rest well, Grace." And for the most part the night (or morning in this case) is peaceful.

~ ~ ~

When Catalina wakes up, the first thing she thinks is if her sisters are home or not. With one look around the room, however, the events of the night before come back to her.

The nightmare. The street. The men. The girl. Cathy and Grace. She's in Cathy and Grace's house.

Catalina starts to get up, wincing slightly because of all the bruises she got. Cathy and Grace didn't wake her up, that's a good thing. The young girl takes a look around the room, seeing a lot of yellow and gold, though some white and black too. She quite likes it.

There's a loud clatter that comes from downstairs, causing Catalina to jump a little. Cautiously, the seven year old walks downstairs to, sure enough, find the two adults who brought her here.

"Cathy, you're just getting a cup of coffee, how did you manage to spill all this stuff?!"

"I forgot where the mugs were!"

"You sleep deprived child, you live here for god's sake!" Catalina smiles. Cathy and Grace seem to be arguing, but they don't seem mad like she normally sees. It's different with Isabela and Joanna.

Cathy sees a small figure come down the stairs and her head turns towards that direction. She, along with Grace, is glad to see Catalina up and seemingly rested.

"Hey Catalina! You sleep well?" The child nods, still not sure if she should fully trust them despite all the good things she's seen. "Good."

"While _I_ clean up _Cathy's_ mess," Grace starts, sending Cathy a pointed look, "Cathy was thinking of ordering sandwiches for lunch. Is that alright with you?" Catalina nods again. Sandwiches sound good.

"Great. Could you come here so I know what you want?" Catalina finds herself obeying Cathy. Cathy, and she supposes Grace, isn't so bad. She likes her. Unlike what happened before.

Maybe this won't be like before.

~ ~ ~

The first day with Cathy and Grace, nothing happens. Though, they ask Catalina if she wants to switch to a different room, and she declines. She likes the yellow room better than the others.

The second day they hear nothing.

The third, still no sign of Catalina's family.

The fourth, the adults are given custody of Catalina because her sisters are deemed "missing". Cathy and Grace are confused as to why they said sisters instead of parents, but don't pressure Catalina into talking. The girl doesn't want to talk about it anyway.

The fifth, Wednesday, they find out Catalina goes to the local public school. They give the office a call, explaining the situation and request Catalina be excused from school for the rest of the week. The seven year old hears everything.

She doesn't understand why people think she needs to "heal". If she doesn't think about it, she feels fine. She feels like she always does. So why give her a break? She doesn't say anything though, to avoid going to school.

She doesn't exactly have friends anyway. Not anymore. But that's another thing she doesn't think about. Because again, if she doesn't think about it, she doesn't feel sad. She feels fine. And that's what everyone wants. Because no one wants to see a sad child. So Catalina doesn't make herself feel sad.

The next two days, Cathy and Grace try to bond with the new, official, foster child. Catalina likes the movies and the games, mostly because she beats them. Just as she's starting to become comfortable around the two, something happens Friday night that seems to be a setback for her.

Nightmare.

It's the same one she got last week. And the one two days before that. And the day before that. And three days before that. Well, let's just say she gets the nightmare often.

It starts out at the park. Her sister Maria is pushing her on the swings, her other siblings are playing on the merry-go-round while her parents are watching. She closes her eyes. Even if she doesn't want to because she knows what happens next, they close anyway.

Then she falls onto the ground, hard. Opening her eyes, she pushes herself up into a sitting position and looks around to find she's all alone.

She sees her father walking on the sidewalk away from the park. Immediately, she stands up and runs toward him, calling out his name. She calls and calls and when she finally reaches him to give him a hug, he disappears into thin air.

Her mother's voice rings in her ears. She spins around, looking for the familiar face, only to find no one. She sees her brother's ball roll onto the street, and after looking both ways, she starts walking towards it. She didn't hear the car speeding down the street. She only hears the screams of her mother as she pushes her out of the way.

Catalina can only stare at the dead body as her older siblings drag her away. Instead of walking back home like she remembers doing, they walk into an alleyway. Isabela and Joanna are the ones who are gripping tightly to her wrists. They almost make it to the end of the alley when two gun shots are heard. 

The three of them turn around just in time to see John's and Maria's bodies fall to the ground. Catalina can only stare in shock as she's once again dragged away and out of the alley. A white flash blinds her.

But it's different this time.

This time as her vision clears, she's not awake. She's being carried by Isabela. She can't move, her body is too limp. Their walking comes to a stop Isabela puts her down onto the sidewalk. Catalina still can't get up.

"Wherever she ends up, I'm sure she'll be fine." Catalina recognizes the voice as Joanna's. "I pity whoever has to take care of the broken thing." 

"Just be glad it isn't us." This time it's Isabela talking. "We have more important things to do anyway. Lina's too much work." That confuses Catalina for a bit, because she doesn't recall Isabela and Joanna ever paying attention to her. They cook, leave whatever's left over to Catalina, and that's basically it.

"Not that we ever did anything." Small giggles are exchanged between the two as they leave their youngest sibling on the ground. Right before Catalina wakes up, she hears more laughter, this time coming from deeper voices. She recognizes them as the men. But did her sisters really say that before she woke up?

It's now that she jolts up in bed, beads of sweat forming on her head. Catalina doesn't usually think that dreams could tell the truth but... Her sisters left her behind? The poor girl had been clinging onto that small hope that all of her family actually cared for her, when in reality, she knows the only one who cared was her mother. And maybe John and Maria because they played with her sometimes, but it wasn't like her mother.

And she died trying to save her life.

The truth sits in the seven year old's brain. As it does, Catalina's breathing turns heavy, her eyes staring down at her hands as her emotions get the best of her. Everything, memories come back, and they're running through her mind until she can't push it down and ignore it like she always does.

She just....cries.

She cries as quietly as she can, she doesn't want anyone hearing her, and curls herself up into a ball. She wants to make herself as small as she can. She wants to disappear. Her mother is gone. Her family is gone. Everyone is gone.

Cathy and Grace are here. They're taking care of her. But so did Isabela and Joanna. And they left her. Are Cathy and Grace going to leave her too? She wouldn't be surprised if they did.

The writer, who was staying up late as always, hears the quiet voice from her room. At first she thinks the girl just can't sleep, until she checks the time on her laptop. 2 a.m. Catalina couldn't have just not been able to fall asleep as she went to bed at 10.

Cathy quickly saves her work before shutting her laptop and tiptoeing into the hallway. She quietly makes her way to the yellow/gold room, remembering to knock on the door before opening.

The blue girl's eyes soften when she sees how unstable Catalina clearly is. Soft eyes meet panicking ones as the adult walks in slowly. Catalina doesn't move from her position, not knowing what to do. She hasn't broken down like this in a long time, much less been seen breaking down.

She focuses on the creaking of the bed as Cathy sits down. Cathy gently places a hand on her knee, causing her to flinch a bit. Still not letting her guard down, the youngest lowers her knees, but still curls into herself.

"Catalina. Are you--well, you're clearly not alright..." Cathy cuts off probably one of the most obvious questions. She found Catalina crying, of course she's not okay. "How about this. Are you calm enough to talk?"

"I guess." The more introvert of the household makes note of the short answers. Kind of like when they first met the girl.

"Okay. I'm just going to ask some short questions so you don't have to talk as much." Cathy really seems to care about Catalina. Unless she's lying. Unless she's going to leave her like everyone else did. "Did you get some sleep?"

"Yes."

"Did you have a bad dream? That's why you woke up?"

"......Yes."

"Do you still remember it?" Catalina purses her lips and draws her eyes away from Cathy's. She pauses for a moment before nodding. "Okay...have you had the dream before?" Another nod. 

Cathy doesn't want to force Catalina into talking about it if it's a sensitive topic, but something tells Cathy that it'd help the girl more than she thinks.

"Are you okay?" The young voice is almost nonexistent as the writer is turned away from her thoughts.

"Yes, I am. And, I'm sure you don't want to talk about it. But you know, I think it might help you calm down if you do. Maybe you won't get the dream again?" That makes the girl pause. She hates getting the nightmare. She hates waking up and wanting nothing but to cry. She hates that she breaks down.

If she tells Cathy, will she leave? Will she pity her like she sees other adults do all the time? Will she ignore her and tell her to grow up like her sisters do? But if she doesn't tell her, will she get the dream again? Probably.

She really hates getting the dream.

"Okay." She simply says. Cathy is shocked that her words convinced the child to open up.

"Are you sure?" She clarifies, wanting to make extra sure she didn't pressure the girl into anything she doesn't want to do. Catalina nods. She's sure. "Okay." The seven year old takes a deep breath before starting.

"Me and my family were at the park. Everyone: mother, father, Isabela, John, Joanna, and Maria and me. I closed my eyes for a little bit and I fell. When I opened my eyes I was alone. I saw father walking away so I went up to him. But when I got there he went away."

Catalina pauses at the next part. Something the Cathy silently makes note of. Catalina recalls the following events a bit more hesitantly.

"Then I heard mother's voice, but I didn't see her. I saw John's ball roll into the street so I looked both ways and went to get it. And then, I heard mother screaming and she pushed me out of the way. And...I turned around and she was dead."

Cathy tries her best not to react, in fear that any type of reaction would make Catalina stop. And judging by the girl's expression, she hasn't talked about this stuff with anyone before. Or maybe in a long time at least.

"Isabela and Joanna dragged me into an alley and then we heard guns. And when we turned around, John and Maria fell..." The speed at which Catalina tells the story continues to slow down. "But when I tried to go to them, Isabela and Joanna dragged me away." A longer silence follows, so Cathy speaks up, though her volume is but a whisper.

"Is that it?" Catalina hesitates at first, but shakes her head. Cathy quiets herself so the seven year old can continue.

"There was a flash and when it went away, Isabela was carrying me. Then she put me down and she and Joanna started talking... And they said they didn't want me and they left me there. They were laughing and then some other people started laughing and then I woke up."

It's only now that Cathy realizes the tears that are once again streaming down the girl's face. Slowly, as to not startle her, the blue girl wipes them away.

"Okay, if it's alright, I'm going to ask you some more questions. Just so I can try and figure why you had the dream and how to help. You don't have to answer all of them. Okay?" The younger nods. "Okay. Um, what happened to your father?"

"He left us. Isabela said he didn't love us, but I was too young to remember."

"Do you miss them? Your mother, John and Maria?"

".....Pass."

"That's alright. What happened after....that?" Cathy avoids saying that they died, since Catalina didn't answer her previous question.

"Isabela is an adult now so she took care of Joanna and me. Sort of." So Isabela became guardian for her younger siblings.

"What do you mean?" She really hopes she isn't crossing a line with this.

"Isabela and Joanna never talk to me. They just cook food then let me do whatever as long as I behave and do good in school." That doesn't sound like her siblings care, in Cathy's opinion.

"Alright." Catalina is confused by the lack of a reaction. Is she pitying her? Sad? Worried? "From what I got, I think you might be getting the dream because you miss them a lot. As for Isabela and Joanna...I'm not entirely sure, but we can do it one step at a time. How many times have you talked about them?"

".....One." That's a surprisingly and alarmingly low number. But at least she's talked about it before.

"That's alright. Who was it with?"

"You." That makes it more alarming. "I tried to before but everyone said to grow up or they started talking about themselves." And the bar only rises. "Are you mad?"

"No, I'm not. There's nothing to be mad about. I'm just shocked you haven't talked about it before." The child only shrugs as a response. "Well, since you look extremely tired, how about this. We can stop talking now, and you can go to sleep." That sounds good to Catalina. She's already surprised that she's told that much to an almost-stranger-but-not-really-stranger. "But, I want to ask that you come to me or Grace if you ever...remember them and feel sad, or.....anything, really. Alright?"

Catalina thinks about it for a moment. But it doesn't take that long for her to respond.

"Okay. But...can you not tell Grace?" Cathy understands why the girl would want to keep it a secret. She hasn't talked about her family to anyone before, not to mention the situation with her being their foster child. There's bound to be some slight distrust at first.

"You don't have to go to Grace to talk if you don't want to. But, I do think Grace should at least know some general backstory." Catalina tilts her head in question. "I need to tell her some stuff, but I won't tell everything." 

"......Okay."

~ ~ ~

Grace gets told the story, and Catalina is relieved that almost nothing changes. Well, until Monday comes around again. As much as she doesn't want to go to school, Cathy and Grace make her go.

It doesn't make sense. She could just be homeschooled like her friend that she sometimes plays with at the park. She's younger than her, but she's really nice. And she said homeschool works like regular school.

But no. She has to go back to the public school.

"Hey Catalina." Grace gets the schoolgirl's attention before she gets out of the car. "If you space out, the day goes by faster." That earns the girl in black an elbow in the stomach from the seat next to her.

"Don't listen to her. Please pay attention." Catalina smiles and nods as she gets out of the car and walks through the front doors. Thankfully for her, the school uniforms make it seem like everything's normal and nothing's changed. Unfortunately, all her classmates know something's up when the teacher comes up to her for a 'private talk'.

Private talks are never good. If you get called for a private talk, you might have a bad grade, or you broke the rules, or in Catalina's case, something's wrong with your family. The only normal private talk is if you were absent.

Catalina _was_ absent, but her classmates know enough to know that that's not the only reason their teacher is talking to her. They know her family has problems.

Her classmates avoid her like the plague. It's not like they haven't ignored her before, it's just that now they go through _any_ cost to avoid her. If she wasn't alone before, she sure is now.

The school day goes on like that. In isolation. More so than before. Lunch and recess she's by herself, but she's used to that. She expects to be alone. She doesn't expect what happens after school.

As the bell rings and she, along with her class, files out of the classroom, someone grabs hold of her wrist and pulls her away. They don't stop until they reach the playground, and Catalina finally recognizes the face as the well-known and very despised class snitch.

Well, all the teachers like him because he's a teacher's pet and tells on everyone. He's actually kinda popular though, but that's because of his parents. If he had regular parents, people would hate him as much as Catalina does. Because he's a snitch.

"What do you want?!" Catalina sort-of-yells out, now noticing the snitch's group of friends surrounding her in a circle.

"I wanna show you something." It's then that he punches the girl in the stomach, causing Catalina to hunch over in pain. "That's what _orphans_ get." The title of 'orphan' causes Catalina to flinch, and the circle to laugh. "We don't want no _orphans_ at our school."

"No orphans! No orphans!" The circle cackles. They start walking towards Catalina, surrounding her to prevent escape. And with that, she's brought back to that night. And the men. They wanted to do bad things. She doesn't want that.

Someone pushes her over and she falls hard onto the blacktop. She curls in on herself as the other kids start hurting her. Catalina doesn't want to cry, but she does. She wants out. She wants to go home. She wants-

"Catalina!" Footsteps are heard running towards her. Catalina perks her head up at the familiar voice. She came looking for her? That's different.

~ ~ ~

Grace isn't going to lie, she's both jealous and worried that Catalina has opened up to Cathy, but not her. She knows that it'd take a little longer for Catalina to trust her--she already bonded with Cathy over Spanish on their first night after all. Spanish. Such a simple thing, yet it had this much of an impact.

Though, she's probably overlooking it. As Vicki and Courtney have reminded her, it's going to happen, she just has to be patient. Well, she _can_ be patient. On certain situations. Especially _not_ traffic. God forbid traffic.

But, she'll have to see it through with Catalina. She's one of two of her foster parents--her guardians. She'll do it for her.

The black-haired girl is the one picking up Catalina. It would've been both of them, but Cathy suddenly has a meeting that she has to go to--which by the way, she's a writer, what meetings does a writer go to? So it's just Grace.

She waits in the parking lot for the seven year old to walk out, but doesn't see her right away. Of course, she could just be talking to a teacher, or her class got held up. But something's a bit off.

Catalina specifically said to get there before the bell, because she'd be out the door right after the bell rang. And she isn't the type to let down on something like that (well, from what Grace gathered in the short time she's been at their house).

And so, she exits the car and walks around the school. She's glad she does, as she turns the corner just in time to see the young girl get pushed over by a group of boys. That certainly would _not_ do.

"Catalina!" Grace runs towards the group of schoolchildren, a stern look upon her face as she addresses the circle first. "Just what do you think you're doing?" One of the boys turns to her quivering.

"Miss! She tried punching me and my friends so we pushed her! It's self-defense." The audacity of this kid. Grace sees right through the act (one thing Catalina would learn to appreciate and admire later).

"Uh huh. And I'm sure punching and kicking her while she's one the ground is 'self-defense' to huh? Go home. All of you."

"B-but.."

"Go. Home. Before I tell the principal." With that the boys run off, their 'leader' calling out.

"My father will hear about this!"

"Yeah yeah. Go ahead. I'm not scared of him!" Grace yells right back. She directs her attention to the child she's grown to be protective of, her voice softening. "Are you alright, Catalina?"

Catalina nods, still a bit shaken at the situation. She guesses she's a bully target now. The girl in black notices the tear stains on the child's face.

"I'm alright. Can we go now?" Grace agrees, holding out her hand. Catalina takes it as she gets up, and doesn't let go until they reach the car. "Where's Cathy?"

"She had a meeting to go to. Sorry she couldn't come."

"It's okay." Grace pulls out of the parking lot. As she drives to the main road, she starts asking a couple of questions, praying she doesn't step a line.

"Did they say anything to you?" Catalina is conflicted. She actually _wants_ to talk about what happened (for once), but she doesn't know if she should tell Grace. "You don't have to answer if you don't want to. I get it if you wanna talk to Cathy." There's a small silence as Catalina thinks it over again.

"...They called me an orphan. They said they didn't want no orphans at our school and started laughing." The driver resists the urge to look back and comfort the passenger. "I know I don't have parents, but--"

"Hey. Don't listen to them." Grace cuts her off. "So what if your family and life is different than theirs? I'd say you're a lot smarter and better than they'll ever be."

"I'm not that smart..."

"Don't play with me. I've seen your grades." Catalina puts on a small smile, trying to hide the blush creeping on her cheeks. "Is that it?" The first grader makes the decision to tell Grace about the men.

"When they were all around me, they...um." Catalina takes a few seconds to calm herself, Grace being as patient as ever. "They reminded me of the men. From that night."

"I...don't think you've told us about them. This happened before you saw Lucy?" Grace asks in clarification.

"When I woke up on the sidewalk, I saw a group of men. They came up to me and made a circle around me. They were laughing and asked me to come with them. When I said no, one of them tried grabbing me, but I kicked him and ran away." Grace has a couple of questions, but settles on one.

"That's when you ran into Lucy, right?" The adult sees the kid nod in the mirror. "God, some people are just fu--messed up as hel--heck." Catalina giggles at the way Grace changes her words, the latter mentally facepalming. "Moving on, glad you got away." Grace pulls up into the driveway. "And that you kicked his ass..." She mutters to herself, praying that Catalina doesn't hear. That's not the case.

"I'm telling Cathy."

"Oh god, please don't. She's going to kill me." Catalina giggles once more as the duo exits the car, now approaching the house. "But in all serious. Thank you for telling me. I was starting to think I was doing something wrong." The little Spanish girl shakes her head.

"I like you and Cathy now." That warms the foster parent's heart, thankful that she's (along with Cathy) doing a good job.

"Aw. Thank Catalina."

"You can call me Lina if you want."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah." The two share a smile.

"Okay. Lina it is then."

~ ~ ~

Five days later, the trio is brought to court. At first, Lina doesn't understand why, but then she sees her sisters. Isabela and Joanna. They found them. They really did.

There's a man sitting in a really big seat. He looks to be wearing a really long black dress, but Lina can't tell because she can only see the top half of his body.

Cathy and Grace told her she's going to have to answer a bunch of questions. They said it's because they need to decide something, but they didn't tell her what. Which annoyed her, but she didn't press further.

"Please state your name."

"Catalina Aragon."

"How old are you?"

"Seven."

"Can you tell us where your parents are?" Lina glances at Cathy and Grace, who nod.

"...Father left us when I was little. Mother died."

"Please describe your relationship with Isabela and Joanna."

"Huh?"

"Apologies. How do you know them?"

"They're my sisters."

"Do you have any other siblings?"

"...Not anymore." The process continues on like that. When she's done answering, Lucy does some talking, then someone from her sister's side of the room. Isabela and Joanna also answer some questions.

It takes a long time. Lina yawns from boredom, having been left in the dark about why she's here in the first place.

After a while, the man in the big chair asks everyone to leave, except for Lina. She's looks to Grace and Cathy in fear, but they don't say anything; just squeeze her shoulder and nod before following everyone else.

"Sorry darling. You don't know what's going on, do you?" Catalina shakes her head. "Since we found your sisters, we need to know who you'll be staying with."

"Oh." Is all Catalina manages to say.

"I had you stay behind, because I'd like to know what you think. Who would _you_ like to stay with?"

Lina takes a moment to think about it. Her sisters are her only family left, where Grace and Cathy are just...not. But Cathy and Grace talk and play with her, where Isabela and Joanna...don't.

"Um...I choose...

~ ~ ~

"Lina! You're gonna be late!"

"Do I _have_ to go?"

"Yes, now come on!" Lina rolls her eyes, but makes her way down the stairs in her school uniform. She's greeted by the familiar faces she's grown to like. "Hurry up! You're gonna be late."

"You already said that."

"Shut up!" The first-almost-second grader giggles at her official guardian's antics as they all pile into the car. Before she gets out of the car, the driver reminds her, "Pay attention in school."

"Look who's talking." The driver makes a 'zip it' motion with her hand, causing Lina to burst into laughter once more. Lina gets out of the car, but not before calling after her caretakers.

"Bye Cathy! Bye Grace!" Let Lina correct her earlier statement. Because as much as she misses her mother and family, she's really happy staying with Cathy and Grace. They're now familiar faces she's grown to love.

And that's the best thing ever.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Estoy realmente muy cansada--i'm actually really tired  
> ¿Hablas español tambien?--you speak Spanish too?  
> sí, mis padres me enseñaron--yes, my parents taught me
> 
> i don't remember what it's like to be a kid, i'm in high school, it's been a while. if someone could give me validation that it's alright, or tell me how to fix it, that'll settle my writer's anxiety, thank you.


	3. Anna

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Meet, Anna!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw: claustrophobia
> 
> and ur gonna need translate a lot for this chapter, there's too much so i didn't put it in the notes this time.
> 
> (ps, it takes sooooooo hecking long to get these chapters out ahh)

It's two months after Cathy and Grace first met Lina. And she's been one of the greatest things ever. The black and blue duo make sure to fill in the teal and orange duo on the foster parenting, and vice versa.

Lina and Collette often have playdates, which end up with Vicki and Courtney staying for meals more so than before. The kids are always talking about how they wish they were in the same class because they're the same age. And that way they can take down Snitch. The nickname caused them to be scolded by Courtney, but they're telling the truth. He really is a Snitch.

And life's been pretty good. Cathy and Grace have learned that Lina can be very _wild_ when she so desires, causing some very mixed emotions to stir up. Lina always laughs whenever it happens for that very reason.

The last day of school comes, and Lina is free for the summer. Just her and Cathy and Grace, and sometimes Vicki, Courtney, and Collette. Or so she thinks.

Because the next day, Cathy and Grace tell her that they need to go meet Lucy. Which _would_ be fine if they didn't say Lucy called. Last time Lucy called, the group had to go to court, which was scary, tiring, and boring. What could she possibly want them to do now?

(・_・ ) (・_・ ) (・_・ )

She wakes up curled inside of a small area. Another day, she supposes. She's used to the bouncing and rattling from outside that makes her shake.

She wishes she could get up and stretch. She wants to go outside and play. She wants her mama and papa and Amalia and Sibylle and William. Even if no one liked her except Amalia. But either way, she can't see them. Because she's in here. And she can't get out.

She remembers saying bye and the only people there were Amalia and papa. She remembers Amalia kissing her cheek before papa pushed her away and sealed up the box. She wants to go back.

But she knows she can't go back.

(・_・ ) (・_・ ) (・_・ )

As they drive, Cathy and Grace can see that Lina isn't all too fond of them going, especially with the timing, but that's just how it goes sometimes.

Catalina's question is answered when they arrive and Lucy is holding hands with a girl. She looks younger than her, her shirt is red, and her hair is long and messy. The seven year old only hopes that she's not coming with them.

"Thank you girls again for coming." Lucy starts with. "At least it's not 3 am this time." This makes the adults quietly laugh, as the children stay silent. They make eye contact, the older with a suspicious look, whilst the younger has a more timid expression.

"It's no problem, Lucy." Cathy assures as Grace leans down towards the smaller girl.

"Who's this one?" Lucy gives the child's hand a small squeeze, and with a small smile, she introduces herself.

"Ich bin Anna." Lina thinks the way the girl talks is a bit funny, but she doesn't say anything because Cathy says it's not nice to say things like that. Speaking of which, the writer turns to the social worker with a confused expression.

"She's come quite a long way--from Germany." Lucy explains, but Cathy's face of confusion doesn't leave. How are they supposed to talk to her?

Fortunately, and apparently, Grace knows just how to do it.

"Hallo Anna, ich bin Grace." Grace introduces. She supposes taking German in school wasn't the worst decision of her life. "Das ist Cathy und das ist Lina." The girl in black points to the blue and yellow girls accordingly, Anna quickly taking in the information. "Sprechen Sie Englisch?"

"Sehr wenig. Ich bin nicht sehr gut." It takes a bit for Grace to translate, it's been a couple years after all, but she's able to understand. The other three marvel at how well the two are communicating, while not understanding a thing. Cathy now understands how Grace feels when she talks with Lina in Spanish.

"Kannst du es versuchen?" The black-haired girl has no idea how she remembers this much, but she is _so_ thankful for it. Anna nods, her bashfulness quickly fading away the more she talks.

"I am Anna. I am five." After re-introducing herself in English, Anna extends her right hand out for them to shake. Grace, as she's closest, shakes it first, Cathy following after. Lina doesn't shake her hand, observing the girl from behind _her_ foster parents.

"It's very nice to meet you Anna. Right, Lina?" The older of the children appreciates that she's finally being mentioned, but shrugs as a response.

"I guess."

~ ~ ~

As expected, Anna stays closer to Grace, just because she can translate. Well, sort of. Anna can't help but giggle whenever she says something wrong...which is a lot.

Anna is, as the others have found, very outgoing. She's settled in faster than Lina, having always been quick to trust others. Which in this case is an upside.

But even if she's quick to trust them, she hasn't told them anything about how she got there, where her family is, etc. She doesn't think she needs to. It's not like Lina where she specifically didn't because she didn't want to. She just doesn't think it's important.

She quite honestly doesn't care. Although she does miss it back in Germany sometimes, she loves living with Cathy and Grace and Lina. To be frank, she's forgotten how bad it was because living here is _so good_.

"Das ist besser als alleine zu spielen." Anna randomly says one day, quite nonchalantly. Cathy and Lina had gone to the bookstore, so Grace and Anna are left alone in the house.

"What do you mean?"

"Papa, mama, Sibylle, and William did not play with me. Amalia play with me but she busy a lot." Cathy, Grace, and a reluctant Lina have been helping Anna with learning more English. She's gotten quite good but still speaks in broken English at times.

"They didn't play with you? Were they busy?" Grace starts a bit slowly, wondering if the reason Anna never talked about her home, is for the same reason Catalina had been closed off. Of course, Anna is two years younger than Lina. And Lina was in worse shape when they met her. So they _are_ different, but again the possibility is what makes Grace act this way.

"They didn't like me. Said 'Du hättest nicht geboren werden sollen. Wir können nicht alle von euch füttern'." Anna deepens her voice to mimic her father before laughing at her impression. Grace smiles softly, glad that the German girl is happy, but also still concerned at Anna's lack of concern.

"Did they hurt you?" Anna shakes her head, still not showing any kind of remorse or hesitation.

"No. Just did not look at me." Perhaps Anna was neglected so she ran away? But she had mentioned a sister who played with her, so she wouldn't want to leave her. Maybe her sister is here as well?

"What about your sister? Amalia?" Anna's eyes light up. She gets to talk about her favorite-est person ever!

"Amalia is bestest person ever! She plays with me when papa doesn't make her work." Anna smiles wide as she remembers, but slowly her fave turns into a frown. Amalia isn't here now. She's back home. Will she ever see her again? "....I miss home."

She remembers them. Even if they ignored her, they were still her family. Of course she loves them. Of course she misses them. Of course she wants to go back to them.

Grace opens her arms, offering a hug. The five year old accepts it gracefully, cuddling quickly into the black-haired girl's embrace. Grace gently rubs Anna's back as she continues to talk.

"If you don't mind me asking...how'd you get here?" The child doesn't move away from her position as she answers this.

"Papa said 'Wir können dich nicht mehr hier haben. Ich versende dich an einen besseren Ort.' He put me in a box and closed it and I stay there." Grace's eyes widen at this answer, but thankfully Anna doesn't see the reaction. Her father shipped her away? Literally. In a box. The poor thing.

"For how long?" Anna shrugs. There wasn't a clock. She just woke up, ate some food that her papa put into the box with her, played limitedly with the size and contents of the box, then went back to sleep.

"I don't know. But one time, box stopped moving, and it opened, and I met Lucy." Grace fits the following events together in her brain. Anna must've coincidentally been shipped to Lucy's place. So when Lucy opened the box to find Anna, she must've gone to the office and did some looking. When she found nothing, she called them.

"Well, I think we're very lucky that Lucy found you." Anna nods, quick to agree. "I also think that...it's okay to miss home. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm sure you were scared being in a new place without you're family."

"..Just a tiny bit." Anna admits sheepishly. That makes Grace laugh. "But I like you girls." The girl in black squeezes the girl in red's shoulders before letting go.

"I'm glad."

~ ~ ~

Cathy's up late again because why wouldn't she? Though, the blue girl is about to turn in when she hears someone's breath quickening. At first she thinks it's Catalina, as Anna had settled in much easier, and exits her bedroom towards the seven year old's. She stops in place when the breathing turns into a shout.

"NOO!" Cathy realizes the voice doesn't sound like Lina's. It's one with a very heavy German accent. Hearing this, the writer changes course to the red room.

When they first brought Anna to the house, the first thing they did was let her wander through the bedrooms, letting her pick. Lina had protectively stood in front of her own room whilst the younger peeked in and out of the other colored rooms. She caught sight of the red room and immediately declared it hers. Lina only stared.

Cathy knocks before creaking the door open.

"Amalia?" Anna's voice is small, like she's on the verge of tears. She's curled up in a ball, sweating, as Cathy opens the door whilst shaking her head.

"It's Cathy." The foster parent walks over to the bed and sits on the edge, knowing Anna is a lot more open to human contact than Lina was. Or...is. "Did you have a nightmare?" The red girl nods, before patting the space next to her. A silent way of asking for a hug. Cathy complies, scooting on over to Anna and embracing her. "Would you like to talk about it?"

"Ja." The writer admittedly gets nervous for a second, thinking she'll have to decipher the shaking girl's German. However, thankfully, Anna is still able to speak in English. Even if it is a bit broken. "I home in Deutschland. Playing with Amalia. Monster push Amalia and trap me. Walls smaller and smaller."

Cathy squeezes Anna's shoulders to prevent her from panicking. Anna uses the pressure to ground herself as she slows down her breathing.

"And then you woke up?" The five year old nods, still trying to calm her anxieties.

Being the bookworm she is, Cathy tries to interpret the dream a little bit. Grace had told her how Anna got here, so there's no doubt it's about that. She remembers Deutschland is Germany, so she started off in her home. The monster must've represented her father, as he's the one who shipped her into England.

But the last sentence is what requires a bit more thinking. Anna had clearly woken up in a panicky state, so something must've frightened her. Could her father have hurt her? There aren't any bruises on her, so that's a no.

Or perhaps she was scared of the space she was in? The walls getting smaller could mean the height, but it could also mean they were moving towards each other. And it was a trap, so perhaps she is afraid of that? The walls closing in.

Cathy should choose her words carefully. She doesn't think she'll trigger the girl, but mostly so Anna can understand what's she's saying.

"Anna....were you...getting squished?" Anna nods, gripping tightly to Cathy's shirt. "Were you scared because of it?

"Yes." That confirms Cathy's theory. Yes, she should probably get an official diagnosis, but she thinks it's safe to say that Anna's claustrophobic. She feels bad that the claustrophobia developed, but it makes sense. After all, she'd been stuck in a box for who knows how long? "Cathy?" The adult hums in response. "Can you stay here?"

"Of course." Anna opens the covers for Cathy to slip in. Once she does, Anna is quick to cuddle up next to her. "Danke." Cathy smirks. She knows this much German at least.

"Bitte." The steady breathing indicates to Cathy that she'd fallen asleep, and she can't help but notice how laid back Anna is about the whole situation.

Compared to Lina, Anna was definitely more open and unbothered by the move. Of course, that could be caused by age, personality, or simply by situation. Lina had to deal with the loss of family members through death, where Anna didn't have that connection from what she's been told.

Though, Cathy really shouldn't be comparing the two girls. What matters is that they're both in her's and Grace's care. And that they're both happy.

~ ~ ~

Lina is not happy. Being payed attention to is one of the great things about living with Cathy and Grace. Well, until _she_ showed up.

Cathy and Grace don't play with her _nearly_ as much now as they did before Anna came. Their attention seems to all be on Anna, and Lina does not like that in the slightest.

She remembers walking into Anna's room last night to try and scare her, when she saw Cathy sleeping in her bed with her. Her cheeks flushed and she went back to her room without a word.

She also remembers the day after, she tricked Anna into the pantry and closed the door. Grace walked in and asked what happened and why Anna was in the pantry. Lina claimed they were playing hide and seek, but Grace opened the door and Anna came rushing out with tears in her eyes. Lina didn't get any dessert that night.

But it's not fair! She's here too! Why can't things go back to before Anna came? It frustrates the seven year old, but her mind isn't currently on that topic. It's on the fact that Collette's coming over. And Vicki and Courtney too, they're nice, but mostly Collette.

When she hears the doorbell, she sprints downstairs, half-heartedly apologizing after Grace's scolding, and makes it to the door just in time for Cathy to open it. Anna's at the table, still doing her extra English lesson for the day.

"Lina!"

"Collette!" The adults smile sweetly at the two friends, as the yellow girl pulls the other into her room, not noticing a certain five year old staring at them. When they make their way upstairs, Lina shuts the door, Collette taking full liberty and plopping down on the bed.

"Vicki and Courtney told me you got a sister." Lina pauses, her back against the door. So Cathy and Grace told Vicki and Courtney. She should've seen that coming.

"She's not my sister." There's no way that she is going to call _Anna_ a part of her family. Much less her sister. She just lives here with them. That's all.

"Oh. Well, Vicki and Courtney got another foster kid and told me to call her my sister." Catalina's eyes widen in shock as she walks over to the bed and sits on it as well. "Her name's Jen. We were going to bring her, but she had a dance class to go to."

"Oh."

While those two are having that conversation, the adults have a conversation of their own in the living room.

"Where's Jen?"

"We were going to bring her, but she has dance right now... How's Anna settling in?" 

"She's doing great. She opened up a lot quicker than Lina did, actually."

"How's she taking it, by the way? Lina?" When thought about, Cathy and Grace realize they hadn't exactly payed attention to how the seven year old is handling it. For the record, she hasn't done anything too harsh. Excluding, of course, the pantry incident.

"In all honesty..." Cathy starts. "I don't think we've been paying attention to that. But now that I think about it, Lina's been extremely civil with her."

"Yeah, the most she's done is...trap her in the pantry." Grace adds, slowing down as she realizes what she's said. "God, we probably made a mistake, huh?" Courtney rolls her eyes at this.

"Come on now. No one said this was easy. They'll get along eventually. But.....maybe you oughta pay a bit more attention?" Vicki shoulders the orange girl.

"Courtney, this is Grace and Cathy we're talking about. I'm sure they spend plenty of time with each of them." Cathy and Grace each let out a tiny chuckle. "And I'm sure a lot of their time is spent with _both_ of them at _the same time._ " The teal girl's emphasis causes her to receive an orange to her head, thrown by the girl in black. Nevertheless, the group laughs.

" _Thank you_. For your _vote of assurance_ , Vicki." Just before someone else can respond, Anna walks into the living room.

"Grace, I'm done." Seeing the new faces for the first time, the German girls politely waves and introduces herself to them before receiving her answer. "Hi. I'm Anna." The blonde and her housemate smile and wave, introducing themselves before the black-haired adult addresses the black-haired child.

"Why don't you go upstairs and see what Lina and Collette are up to?" Eagerly, Anna nods, and runs off to the yellow room. Or, Catalina's bedroom.

Anna doesn't bother knocking on the door, since 1, she's supposed to be here; and 2, Lina doesn't have anything to hide right now. The red girl is slightly intimidated by the girls two years older than her, but she's ultimately her natural, friendly self.

As she walks in, Collette and Lina turn their attention to the opening door. Lina's made it very clear to Anna that she doesn't want her in her room unless on specific orders (of course, Cathy and Grace don't know about this exchange).

Naturally, Lina's expression is slightly annoyed--she tries her best to keep her cool, since Collette is here. Collette, on the other hand, is somewhat intrigued. All she knows about Anna is that she's from Germany, and lives here now. Naturally, a mind as curious as hers would be interested.

"Hi Lina." No one knew of the exchange that is about to happen.

~ ~ ~

It had only been about 15 minutes when a pair of footsteps comes running down the stairs. At first, the adults pay no attention to it, thinking the girls have found a game to play. More feet quickly follow, clearly signaling a chase going on. The sounds trail back up the stairs, and it goes quiet for a little bit. Then a shout is heard.

"Ich wünschte ich hätte dich nie getroffen!" That sends a worried chill down Cathy and Grace's spines, especially as the girl who shouted runs towards them, burying her face into Cathy's lap.

"Anna? What's wrong?" Before answering, Anna seats herself onto Cathy, now burying her face into her shirt. The blue girl can feel the tears escaping the child's eyes.

"Fight.....Lina...J-just....wanted....p-play..." Anna manages to choke out between cries, trying to ground herself with the feeling of Cathy's hand rubbing her back. The writer gives her housemate a look, and the latter excuses herself from the group to go upstairs.

Because someone needed a talk.

Grace opens the door to Lina's room, addressing the guest before her foster child.

"Collette, would you mind giving me a moment with Lina?" Both girls hesitate for a second, before Collette complies, exiting the room to find her foster parents. Grace joins Catalina on the floor. "Lina. What's going on?"

Catalina refuses to look Grace in the eye. If she does, she'll be swayed into admitting she'd been jealous. She's been taught against that, and the fact that she feels it right now makes her feel worse. So, no. She will not look at Grace.

"Nothing." She settles on, but is quickly followed with a quiet mutter to herself. "Why don't you go check on Anna? It's not like any more important anymore." Unfortunately for her, Grace overhears it.

"Lina, of course you're important. Neither one of you is more important than the other-"

"Then why do you spend more time with her??" Lina finds herself snapping back at her guardian. She hadn't argued with them before, so she doesn't quite know what to expect from it. "It's all about Anna now, but I'm here too!" Calmly (somehow, in the eyes of Lina), Grace shakes her head.

"I know that. We haven't been the best foster parents lately, because like you said, as much as we try, we haven't been able to spend a lot of time with you. And we haven't spent much time together as a family."

"Anna's not my family."

"Alright. As a house then." Grace doesn't correct Lina's statement, having mentally reminded herself that she'll open up to Anna eventually. "And...it's hard being ignored again. Huh?"

Lina's eyes widen. The thought hadn't crossed her mind before. Why _did_ she feel jealous? Because she's being ignored. But why did that bother her? It takes her a bit to realize the answer to that question.

It's because her family ignored her. Only her mother, and partially Maria and John, payed attention to her. And she lost them. Cathy and Grace played with her. But Anna's taking that away from her. It's happening all over again.

"Yeah."

"I'm really sorry we did that." Lina nods, scooting closer to Grace and leaning her head on her shoulder. "But, that doesn't excuse how you've treated Anna, darling. What did you say to her?"

"....That I wish she stayed in Germany..."

"Oh Lina. That's really hurtful. You know that."

"Sorry." Grace purses her lips, trying to figure out what to say next. After a little consideration, she responds.

"I want you to apologize to Anna, okay? And let her play with you and Collette." Lina's reluctant to agree at first, but guilt washes over her. She knows it's wrong. And so she nods her head. "Thank you. Let's go."

~ ~ ~

Collette is now standing outside the door while Anna and Lina talk in the bedroom. This doesn't bother her, really, she just hates arguing. Especially when it's between family members, and you're the bystander.

The red and yellow girls sit across from each other on the bed, not really looking at each other. The tension is clear as the air, especially with the initial silence.

"I'm sorry Anna." Lina starts, causing Anna's head to lift up. "You should stay here. And you're nice." Anna smiles.

"I'm sorry I said you should leave. I don't want you to." Lina's eyes widen, and at first, Anna's confused before she realizes. She didn't mess up her English that time. The two burst into soft giggles before Anna asks another question. "Why...did you not like me?"

"....I thought you were taking Cathy and Grace away from me....like when my mother died. She was the only one who loved me." Lina finds herself opening up to the younger girl. Mostly because she feels guilty for how she's treated Anna, but she did it nonetheless.

"Oh..." Anna replies. "Amalia was the only one who liked me too."

The two initially thought that they were almost opposites of each other. Where Anna was loud, Lina was (relatively) quiet. Where Anna was extroverted, Lina was introverted. The list goes on.

Yet with this, the two realize they had something in common after all. And that makes them very happy. (And Collette, who totally wasn't listening to see if she could come in).

There's a few seconds of silence before Lina offers what Anna had been hoping for when she first came into the room.

"You wanna play with us?" With that, Collette ( _finally_ , Collette thought) sneaks on in. "We're playing Revolution."

"Ooh! Anna can be the king! Or...queen." Collette suggests. Anna doesn't know what 'Revolution' means, but she likes the idea of being queen. "Anna, can you be mean?"

"Yeah! Play now!" Lina doesn't mention Anna's broken English. She's getting better. She's probably just really excited anyway. But enough of that. 

They have a ruler to overthrow.

~ ~ ~

Cathy goes upstairs to gather the children for food, when she hears...a very interesting role-play going on.

"I'm the queen of the castle! Get down you dirty rascal!"

"Never! Our people are mis...miserb..."

"Just say suffering..."

"Suffering!"

"You will never win! Off with her head!"

"Bleugh!!"

Suddenly, Cathy somewhat regrets talking about Les Misérables with Lina. Somewhat.

"Girls, it's time to eat. You can continue...beheading Anna later?" Lina rolls her eyes.

"Cathy, she's already beheaded."

"Yeah!"

"Anna, dead bodies don't talk." Cathy smirks, chuckling a little bit before continuing her original task.

"Well regardless, it's time to come down. You can continue the revolution later."

"....Okayyyyy." All three kids reply. And the hesitation is all Cathy needs to know that things are going to be much smoother now. She's so glad that Lina and Anna are finally getting along. And she's sure she can officially call them a small family of four.

After all, what are the odds they'll be getting more foster children?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i feel like this chapter is shorter, and that's for two reasons.  
> 1: anna is quick to trust people, so we don't see the skepticism and closed-off-ness we saw from catalina.  
> and 2: anna's story doesn't require much explanation, whereas with catalina, i had more opportunity to hide and slowly reveal it. it just didn't rlly make sense for me to do that for anna.
> 
> plsss gimme validation i have no self esteem yayyyyyyy


	4. Jane

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Meet, Jane!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw: physical (and mental?) abuse-- _mostly_ implied 
> 
> (also, idk if summer reading is still a thing, but i had it in elementary and 2/3 of my middle school years), so they will too i guess)

It's the middle of August. One month after Anna, and two months after Lina. And guess where they are? Because if you guessed meeting up with Lucy at the agency, you're wrong.

Because Lucy came to them.

(・_・ ) (・_・ ) (・_・ )

She remembers her day going like normal when the doorbell rang. She flinched, thinking she forgot about a visitor, and was about to go to her room and change into something 'more presentable' in the eyes of her parents, when she's stopped.

She didn't understand why, until she realized the visitor was not planned.

She doesn't understand why her father was angry with the person at the door. She doesn't understand why she had to go with them. She doesn't understand why she went to multiple other houses with the visitor. She doesn't understand why she's leaving her parents. Her life is normal.

All parents hit their kids....right?

(・_・ ) (・_・ ) (・_・ )

Lina and Anna are in the living room, trying to come up with new game ideas, Grace is cooking in the kitchen, and Cathy is trying to read and not give the girls any more ideas involving beheading. Thankfully, her mouth hasn't slipped yet, but who knows what she might say?

The doorbell rings, and the girls (excluding Grace the chef) go up to the door to answer it. Cathy unlocks the door and opens it, while the children watch from a distance. Cathy's shocked to see the two-tone-haired girl here unannounced, but quickly puts a smile upon her face.

"Hey Lucy! How're you doing?" While the adults talk, Lina and Anna have a little conversation of her own. Leaning down, Lina whispers to the younger.

"If Lucy's here, something big's about to happen." Anna makes an 'o' with her mouth, her mind now going through multiple different options.

"What do you think it is?" The red girl wonders out loud, causing the yellow to shrug. Lina is about to suggest something, when both girls overhear a sentence from the adult conversation.

"I know it seems like I'm dumping kids onto the two of you, but the other places I went to couldn't accept, and the office is being rebuilt, so I thought-"

"Lucy, you really need to stop rambling because it's _fine_. Why don't the two of you come inside, and that way you can tell Grace as well." Lucy thanks Cathy for both herself and the special guest.

Cathy opens the door wider for Lucy and a blonde girl to walk in. As they take off their shoes, Anna and Lina are left staring. More so Lina than Anna.

Upon seeing the blonde girl's face, and making eye contact, she realizes who exactly is in her house. She's happy, yes. But she's also very confused because her parents are really strict. So, how come her playground friend is here?

"..Jane?" Cathy, Lucy, and Anna turn to the seven year old, not expecting her to recognize the guest.

"Hi Lina." Grace peeks at the situation from the kitchen, upon hearing the new voice. The new, _younger_ , voice.

"Lina? Anna? Help set the table, please." The two foster kids of the house call out an okay before heading to the kitchen to grab the settings. Jane feels a bit strange having others set the table for her, but she doesn't say anything. She doesn't want to upset the people living here.

Once everyone is seated, the three children on one side, and the adults on the other, Lucy explains the situation once more. (This time remembering not to ramble and apologize as much).

"Thank you for this. I _did_ try to find someone else to give the two of you a break, but no one could take her. I appreciate how flexible you guys have been. That goes for you girls as well." Lucy points to the children as she says this. Lina and Anna smile in acceptance of the compliment, while Jane remains confused.

"W-what's going on?" She timidly asks, trying not to hunch her shoulders like her parents taught her to. Back straight, shoulders back.

"Oh, I'm terribly sorry, Jane. It must've slipped my mind. Why don't you introduce yourself first, then I'll explain further." She remembers this. Her parents taught her. Jane scoots her chair back and stands up, her hands at her side.

"My name is Jane Seymour. I am six years old. My birthday is on September 24th, and I love my parents and siblings very much." As she finishes, she scoots her chair back and sits once more.

Lina remembers Jane introducing herself like this when they first met on the playground. Both her and Anna think it's a little strange how formal the girl is, but they don't comment. They don't want to get in trouble again.

Cathy and Grace glance at one another, but quick enough so the new child doesn't notice. No six year old would introduce themselves like that unless told so by their parents, and even so, they're bound to mess up. This is a bit too artificial.

But they don't say anything.

"Thanks Jane, now let me explain. I've been getting some calls, and basically they said that you needed to be placed into a better home." That confuses Jane. Her parents are just like any other parents. The only difference is that she's homeschooled. "So, you're going to be staying here."

"Will I go home?" Lucy's expression is now one of sympathy.

"No, I'm afraid not, sweetie." She's not going home? Ever? But why? Her life is normal. Her parents are strict yes, but all parents are like that, right? "You still have your bag, correct?" Ah yes, her bag.

The one she filled with her favorite things. But she didn't pack all of them. If she knew she was never going back, she would've brought everything. But it's too late now. At least she didn't forget Fluffy.

Anna is just being herself. Now she has another sister. Well, Lina is hesitant when she calls her sister, but she lets her anyway. The new girl seems nice. But, Anna's not too happy about being the youngest in the family. Still. Will she _ever_ be the older sibling? Oh well. At least she can get away with more stuff.

Lina's trying to fit pieces together. Her playground friend is here. But Lucy is here too. When Lucy comes without a child, she's visiting, but if there's another girl with her, then she's coming home with them. So, Jane's going to live here with them. The thought excites Lina, but also stirs her curiosity. _Why_ is she staying here and not with her parents?

Jane makes an 'okay' with her mouth and continues eating in silence. No one pushes her.

Cathy and Grace have gotten used to accepting more girls. Granted, this is only their third, and parenting is a lot harder than they make it seem, but they're getting into the swing of things. The best friends know that the six year old will open up in her own time.

But they've also figured out that whatever she went through is a normal for her. Studying her reaction to the announcement, she loves her family dearly. Probably so much that she doesn't realize whatever her parents were doing was bad. The girls hope it isn't anything too harsh.

~ ~ ~

Two days later, Jane is like Anna in settling quickly. Besides missing her family, and the sad fact she won't be seeing them, she likes living with Cathy and Grace and Lina and Anna.

Lina, thankfully, doesn't have any issues with Jane joining their foster family. Mostly due to her knowing her previously. Anna's as friendly as ever, offering her few toys often to her new sister. She, along with Lina, help the six year old with the transition. 

And everything seems to be running smoothly. But of course, life isn't that simple. There's bound to be twists and turns and bumps and frankly, today is one of those days.

Seeing as Anna is still a bit too young, plus she has her extra English lessons, Lina, Jane, Cathy and Grace take turns washing the dishes. This is the only chore for the children, besides cleaning their room and putting away their clothes, but regardless.

Jane's currently in her bedroom. She's picked the purple one--purple has always been her favorite color, along with silver. The girl is playing with her stuffed bunny, Fluffy, when one of the adults calls her downstairs. 

"Jane! It's your turn for dishes!" The blonde quickly makes her way to the kitchen sink, not missing a beat. She doesn't mind doing the dishes, she kind of likes it actually. It does feel a bit weird, having so much time not doing chores, but she thinks she'll get used to it.

The six year old grabs the step stool and positions it in front of the sink, before getting up and rolling her sleeves back. Her routine goes relatively smoothly, until she's drying on of the mugs and drops it on the ground. _Grace's_ mug.

She can hear footsteps and her breath hitches in fear. The pieces are all over the floor. She doesn't want to be punished. Slowly and carefully, Jane maneuvers her way around the shards. She kneels down and tries to pick up the pieces as quickly as possible. But not quickly enough.

Grace, having heard the sound of something breaking, walks into the kitchen to find Jane on the ground next to _very_ sharp pieces of her mug. Jane looks up, fear very apparent in her eyes.

"Jane, what happened?" To the adult, her tone is very calm, and it is, but to the child, all she can process is anger. Disappointment. Very bad feelings that were caused by _her_. She tries fighting back her tears as she tries harder and faster to clean up the mess she made. To clean up her _mistake_.

Mistakes aren't allowed.

The girl in black quickly walks over to Jane (thankfully not having to walk over the shards as Jane was seated on the side facing the entrance) and kneels next to her. Grace tries to gently reach out to her, but Jane's instantly drops the pieces she was holding to cover up her head and curl in on herself. Almost as if...

"Jane, honey. I'm not going to hurt you." She's heard that before. But it was a lie. How does she know Grace isn't lying as well? Seeing that Jane hasn't moved from her tense position, Grace tries again. "Jane, sweetie, it's okay. You're safe." 

Safe. _Safe._ The only time she's safe is at the playground. Where there are too many eyes for her parents to scold her too bad if she does something improper. But then again, there are plenty of bad people outside of her home. So really, is she _ever_ safe? Cathy, Grace, Lina, and Anna haven't done or said anything to scare her. So far.

But she'll decide to take that chance.

"Y-you're not going to hit me?" The girl asks, slowly removing herself from her position.

"Of course not, it's just a mistake." Grace ponders a bit before asking her next question. "...Why would you think I'd hit you?" With the way Jane had flinched earlier, she hopes she isn't crossing a line.

"Mother and father...hit me if I made a mistake. Mistakes are bad because they make mother and father sad." The realization of Jane's story hits Grace. She's an abuse survivor. And perhaps in more ways than one. "I have to be perfect or no one likes me."

"Jane, no one is perfect. If you make a mistake, that's not going to change how we feel about you. Anna adores you, and Lina's your friend from the playground, right?" Jane nods. "And Cathy and I, we care about you. All three of you. A lot."

Jane smiles. Grace sounds like she's telling the truth. However...

"But what if I make another mistake?"

"Then, Cathy and I will help you fix it. And hopefully you'll learn from it too."

"What if it's something _really_ bad?"

"Then...you might get grounded, but we'd never hit you."

"What if-"

"Jane, I don't mean to interrupt, but let me reiterate, we're not going to hit you. Not on purpose. You're safe here." Just a minute ago, Jane had been skeptical about the word. But now, it feels like she actually is. Safe. "Now why don't you run along and play?"

"You're not mad?" Grace shakes her head.

"I'm not. Now why don't you go find Lina and Anna? I think they're _still_ trying to come up with a new game." Jane starts to protest--it's _her_ turn to do the dishes. It's _her_ job--but the black-haired girl puts up a finger, shushing her. "I'll clean up, I don't want you getting cut."

The blonde doesn't exactly want to make Grace do the work. It's _her_ mess, _her_ mistake, _she_ needs to clean it up. But at the same time, she looks like she isn't changing her mind anytime soon.

So she doesn't protest. Giving her a sweet smile and a thanks, she gets up and goes to find her friends. The smile on her face grows a bit more. There's a lot of things now that she didn't have before. 

Playtime. Friends. Safety. And when she thinks about it, happiness. She's really happy here. _Truly_ happy.

~ ~ ~

Since both Cathy and Grace have jobs, it's been decided that Jane go to school in September. Jane was a bit hesitant at first, not sure about the transition from homeschool to public. But the thought of being like the other kids, and like her siblings, makes her agree.

And with that, the foster parents made sure to get Jane enrolled as soon as possible. With enrollment, comes one thing that most students hate. Summer reading assignment.

Upon hearing this, Jane cringes internally, yet also slightly panics. She doesn't exactly like reading, and she isn't that good at it to begin with. Lina had secretly offered to let her copy her answers from last year, but unfortunately for the children, Cathy had overheard the conversation.

According to her, she needs to 'do it for herself' that way she can 'learn'. Although Lina had made the very good point that Jane can learn by seeing the answers, but turns out Cathy isn't going to change her mind anytime soon. Much to the children's dismay.

Anna still has her English work to do, but she's almost done with it, and she's in kindergarten, so she doesn't have summer reading. Lina, second grade, had finished her assignment before Jane had come. So this leaves the blonde with the most work to do, while her friends are left to play.

Well, she's used to hearing this with her siblings. Her parents always payed most attention to her, they had her do a lot of stuff while her siblings went and played. 

She's grown to love having so much time to play in the short time that she's stayed here with Cathy and Grace. And now, since she's fallen into a lot of work again, she supposes she's going back to her old routine again. The break was nice while it lasted.

Jane is set up at the dining table. Cathy's helping Anna with her English work, while Grace and Lina are somewhere else in the house--if she remembers correctly, the backyard garden.

Admittedly, she can't understand what she's reading. What she's doing. But, she can't ask for help. She never asks for help. If she asks, then she'll disappoint them.

And because she can't ask, the soon-to-be first grader stares at her paper, her hands in her lap and fighting back her tears. The only thing worse than asking for help is crying. Crying makes them feel like they're not good parents. And that would be her fault. 

But Cathy notices this. Or, at least the fact that Jane seems to be struggling. When Anna looks up from her paper momentarily, she sees Cathy's looks towards her sister. The blue girl mouths to the red, silently asking for permission. She gets an answer in the form of a nod, and Cathy scoots over to the other child at the table, leaving Anna to finish her last two questions.

"Jane? You doing alright?" Shocked by the sudden address to her, Jane flinches, jerking her head up at Cathy. "Do you need any help?" Jane remembers a lesson she learned the hard way. If someone asks if you need help, politely decline. That's the proper thing to do.

"No thank you." She says, with a shake of her head. To fully sell her claim, she picks up her book and pretends to read it. Cathy admittedly recognizes this behavior from her own childhood. Yes, their situations are completely different, but at least the writer has experienced _similar_ emotions to the new addition to their family.

"You know, it's okay if you don't understand." With the realization that she's been caught, she slowly puts the book back onto the table. "Asking for help's kinda hard, huh?" Jane doesn't dare look at her caretaker as she nods. "I had some trouble asking for help too, when I was your age."

"Really?" The blonde's curiosity gets the best of her (and two certain other children sneakily listen in as well. Of course, Cathy is one to notice these things). "Lina said you're really really smart."

"Well, if she says so then maybe." The brunette starts. "But I still had some trouble understanding my work sometimes. Mostly math." The kids are listening closely, to Cathy's surprise. She didn't think her personal story would be interesting to anyone. "I never asked for help, and soon enough, I failed my test."

"Did you _actually_ fail?" Lina asks, having given up on trying to hide and is now sitting at the table next to Anna.

"Yes, I did. I received an F on the test. But I don't want to scare you." The children's heads tilt in confusion, and their expression are in shock. Shock because the smartest person they know got the worst grade ever, and confusion because why would they be scared? "I don't want you to think that if you don't ask for help, you'll immediately fail." Oh. That's what she meant.

The children, mostly due to their young age, don't take it too seriously. They're mostly focused on the close-to-unbelievable fact that Cathy failed a test. After seeing the nods of understanding to her 'audience', the blue girl continues.

"I thought my mother would be so cross with me. But all that she told me, is that if you ask someone for help, it shows that you trust them well enough. And if they help you, then it shows they care about you. Basically, I hope that you three know that you can come to Grace and I if you need anything, okay? Because we care about you.” Cathy turns to Jane. “Even if it’s something as simple as schoolwork.”

Jane understands what she's saying with this. It's okay that she doesn't understand it. It's okay to ask for help. But _is_ it _really_ okay? Her parents always told her it was bad. But Cathy says it's fine. She _wants_ Jane to ask for help.

So who should she listen to?

It feels like she's asking her to pick between her parents or Cathy and Grace. And she doesn't want to.

If she asks for help, then she'll have more time to play.... But wouldn't that be selfish? She should never be selfish. Her parents taught her that. That's why she never asks for anything.

But...one time couldn't hurt, right?

"U-um....c-could..." Jane finds herself stuttering and struggling to get the words out, yet Cathy understands what she's trying to say. She dismisses (like _actually_ dismisses) the other two specifically so the middle child wouldn't feel pressured.

"Now, why don't we work on this together?" Great. And not sarcastically. Truthfully. Cathy and Grace seem to care about her in a different way than her parents do. But the question is, is it _better_ than before?

~ ~ ~

Lina and Anna _insist_ on going to the park to celebrate Jane's completion of her summer reading. Grace had mumbled that it wasn't that good of a reason until Cathy walked in and smacked her on the head. 

Jane had flinched initially at the action, but the way they both smiled calmed her for some reason. In all honesty, she has no idea why she reacted like that, but since no one noticed, she end up forgetting about it.

After putting on their shoes, the group exits the house, Grace locking the door. The five of them stroll along the sidewalk, the kids and adults having separate conversations, until they reach their destination. The park. More specifically, the playground.

Once the foster parents find a seat at one of the park tables, the kids are free to play. The three stick together, mostly because they live together, but also because they don't recognize anyone else on the playground. 

Well, anyone who's nice enough that they'd be _willing_ to play with.

This fact is mentioned because Lina catches a glimpse of a certain someone who she despises very much. A certain someone who would've beat her to a pulp if Grace hadn't shown up.

Anna and Jane have no knowledge of this event, or his presence, so Lina does what she can to protect them. And that means avoiding him at all costs.

It works for a while, until they get caught up in their game of 'Phantom Thief' and Jane's separated from the group. The red and gold don't notice until they hear the accusing tone of the boy Lina had been trying so hard to avoid.

"Hey blondie." Snitch. It's always Snitch. The little redhead will never leave Lina alone, huh? "Heard you're living with the orphans now." The girl in silver tilts her head in confusion.

"I'm sorry but....I don't think we've met." Lina doesn't want to interact right away, hoping that her friend will be able to leave without anything too bad being said. Snitch laughs.

"That's funny. Everyone knows me. And I know that you're living with the orphans because you're an orphan now."

Jane still isn't understanding what this kid is saying. She's not an orphan, her parents are alive. And she doesn't live with orphans. Well, Anna's parents are alive, and Lina's aren't, but regardless. The main point is that she isn't an orphan.

"But I'm not-"

"Yes you are!" He says it as if it's a matter a fact, his buddies behind him agreeing as if they're little clones of him (though little doesn't mean that much since they're all children). "You're parents don't want you. So they gave you up and now you're an orphan."

Is that really possible? Can one become an orphan just because their parents don't want them? Even so, did her parents send for Lucy? They seemed pretty mad when Lucy came to pick her up, but what if? What if they really didn't want her at the house anymore? 

And now that she's out, would that mean they're not her parents anymore? That she's parentless? How'd it work with Anna, because her parents-maybe-not-parents are still alive.

Wait, then what does that make Cathy and Grace? Are they her parents now? Or do they just take care of her? Or... She doesn't even know at this point. There are so many questions she has now.

But she's pushed to the ground before she can think of any more.

"We don't want no orph--"

"Leave her alone!" Snitch is interrupted by none other than Lina, who has Anna trailing right beside her as they both run over to the situation. Lina stands protectively in front of Jane, as Anna helps the girl up.

"Oh look it's the head orphan." He whispers to his friends, causing them to snicker. Seeing as Snitch hasn't left yet, the brunette speaks up again.

"She didn't do anything to you, so just leave her alone!" The tallest of the kids steps closer.

"Or else what?" He says, threatening her to try something. Lina doesn't say anything at first, just stands her ground, until she's pushed. Not hard enough that she falls, but enough to make her mad. And when she's about to get hit, she does something she _knows_ she's going to regret later.

She punches him.

Unfortunately, this didn't stop her from receiving his punch, but at least she hit him. Hard. Really, the only downside is that there's now a fight going on at the playground, and she's _in_ it, rather than staring at it like all the other kids are.

Snitch's friends starting going after Anna, but, surprisingly, the child two years their junior knows how to dodge and keep them busy without having to throw hits. Lina and Anna yell at Jane to go get Cathy and Grace, and since Jane's incapable of speaking at the moment, she just runs.

Cathy and Grace, who're on the opposite side of the playground, too far to see the situation, are surprised when Jane comes running up to them, wood chips still sticking to her clothes.

"Jane? What's wrong?" The writer asks. Clearly the blonde is still fazed by the whole outbreak, as she says nothing and just starts tugging at their sleeves. "Okay, okay, we're going." The two adults follow the running six year old to a whole bunch of yelling and.....a fight. They got into a fight.

"STOP THIS NONSENSE. RIGHT. NOW."

~ ~ ~

Cathy had walked the three girls home, Grace staying behind as she had a few choice words for Snitch's parents. They arrived, the only words being said by Cathy being the command to sit in the living room.

The oldest of the three sits on the couch, curled up in a ball due to the bruising. The middle child sits next to her, while the youngest sits on the floor.

When the blue girl returns, her hands full with the first aid kit, water, and ice packs, none of the children dare look at her. The silence of the room is one they recognize as death. Not literally, of course, they're not naive. But still death.

They're each given a bottle of water, before Cathy starts talking. Except, her tone isn't strict or cross, she's focusing on their cuts and bruises from the fight. That's a good sign. Maybe she won't talk about it.

"Are the three of you okay?" The kids answer with various forms of yes. "Okay, that's good." With that, the room falls silent, Cathy focusing on bandaging and looking over their 'battle marks'. It isn't like the comfortable silence that often occurs in the Parr (just Cathy since it's technically hers) household. This silence is tense.

Then suddenly Cathy clears her throat, as if she's prompting them to say something. So that means she _is_ talking about it. They're going to get in trouble for something that wasn't their fault.

It happens a lot with Snitch. By that, Lina's referring to the fact that he _always_ gets away with it, and someone else gets in trouble. (There's were two times that he did get in trouble, but that's only two, it doesn't matter) Lina never thought she'd be one of them.

"Would any of you like to explain why you got into a fight today?" Cathy doesn't make direct eye contact, but she can see their lips pursing. "Would you like to decide who's going to talk, or should I pick someone?" They haven't seen this side of Cathy before. Grace can be scary at times, but never Cathy.

"Snitch was bullying Jane and pushed her so Anna and I went over to help Jane and then he was gonna hurt her so I punched him." Lina starts, Anna adding in a little detail that may help their case.

"No, he was gonna punch Lina! Then they started fighting and I distracted his friends so no one hurt Jane." Cathy nods. She knows that the foster kids wouldn't start the fight on their own accord, but it's still a good idea to get the details set in place.

The retelling causes the entirety of the situation to settle into Jane's mind, as she sits in her spot quietly.

She's an orphan? Well, a maybe orphan. Sort of orphan? What he said.....is it true? Did her parents _really_ not want her? And if so, does that _really_ make her an orphan? Well, maybe because if they give you up, it's like they're dead, right? Whoops. Jane probably shouldn't have thought that. Especially because of Lina.

Lina. And Anna. She isn't sure if what he said about them being orphans is correct. But if it is, then they protected her. They took hits and fighted them so she wouldn't get hurt. Why?

Her family wouldn't do that. If she got into the mess, it's her fault and she needs to be punished. Because she deserves it. But with Cathy and Grace and Lina and Anna.....everything seems to be upside down.

And she's not sure if that's a good thing.

"No one hurts my sisters." Because it has the word 'sister', Jane expects the sentence to come from Anna. But it's Lina who says this. Lina who's never referred to Anna as a sister before, much less Anna _and_ Jane.

Everyone's a bit surprised at the sentiment. Unlike Anna, Lina's been hesitant to refer to her new household as her family. And now that she has....everyone's excited, yes. 

But now it's built another set of tracks for Jane's train of thought to run on. Anna had referred to her as sister for a while, but it never stirred this up. Maybe because she was the only one who thought of her like that? Maybe because she's a year younger? But regardless, it's stirred up because _Lina_ thinks of her as a sister.

That would mean they think of her as family. Would that mean she's _officially_ part of Cathy and Grace's family? Or is her family still her parents and siblings? Wait, don't you have to have the same parents to be sisters?

She now has two groups who think of her as family. Does she belong to both? Or does she have to pick one? And only one?

As Jane sat there silently and wrapped up inside her mind, Cathy criticized and scolded them for their actions on the playground today. Violence isn't the answer, blah blah, stuff they already know. (Though Jane was too zoned out to hear Cathy's statement about violence)

"Jane? Are you okay?" It's Anna who notices her discomfort, scooting over slightly and resting her head on the older's knees. The six year old purses her lips, not wanting to talk, but knows very well that this household is much more observant than her previous one.

The attention is turned to her. She never liked these confrontation moments, because she knows that after, she'd get a punishment. But then again, that was with her parents-not-parents (this whole thing is still confusing her). Maybe she wouldn't get hit this time.

"Am I part of your family?" The blonde settles on. Anna and Lina glance at each other, then to Cathy, who answers the question for her.

"Well Jane, Grace and I consider you a part of our family. And it seems Lina and Anna do as well." Before she can continue, Jane asks another question, still not making eye contact, and is a bit deadpan. 

"Does that mean my parents and siblings aren't my family anymore?" The writer doesn't exactly have an answer to this at the moment, but thankfully she doesn't have to answer as Grace does it for her, having came in very quietly about two minutes ago.

"It's really up to you sweetie. If you still consider them as your family, that's fine. But, I will say that...the way they treated you was not...healthy and that is why Lucy asked for you. So that you could be treated better." The girl in black tries to phrase her sentences so that she doesn't explicitly say what they did, in case it would be a trigger for any of their girls.

And that makes sense, what Grace said. It makes sense for all three of the girls, even though two of them have already gotten past that. And though the actual thought of it still lingers in the darker parts of her mind, Jane can rule out the possibility that her parents _sent_ for Lucy to take her away. Now for her final question...

"Are we orphans?" Lina flinches at the word, especially knowing where she got it from.

"How do you figure?"

"Um..." Jane doesn't exactly know how to refer to the boy, since she's never met him before. "H-he...kept saying that I'm an orphan..and that I'm living with orphans now." Apparently Lina had been twitching because when Cathy wraps an arm around her she feels her body calm down and relax.

Grace gives Cathy a look, hoping that she can answer the question. The receiving end sees this silent request, and therefore makes an attempt to quickly come up with a response. Thankfully, it's a successful attempt.

"No. Simple as that. I do not believe you're orphans, you're just kids--very _strong_ kids--who have gone through some situations. There are others like you, Collette and Jen for example. And there are other who will become like you. And there are others who might stay in their situations until they get older. And, in my opinion, the three of you are more stronger, and observant, and caring, than Snitch will ever be."

Everyone giggles softly at that before Cathy finishes.

"I hope the three of you will remember that." Smiles are passed all around the group in comfortable silence. Jane makes eye contact with them for the first time since they arrived back home. "Are you alright, Jane?" The newest addition nods.

"Yeah. I'm just really glad that you're all my family."

Jane may not know what she feels about her parents and siblings now. She doesn't exactly understand what they did that she had to be taken away. But what she does know?

She knows that while living with Cathy and Grace, she's felt safe. She feels very very happy. She loves playing with Lina and Anna. She loves that Cathy and Grace don't hit her. She loves that it's different than before. 

She loves _them_.

And right now, that's all she wants to focus on.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i would like to ask if the bit with Cathy was realistic and also okay, because (though it might be me personally) i feel when adults tell stories about their past to "tell a lesson" it sometimes feels like they still don't understand. but....at the same time, they're still really young....idk. writer's anxiety amiright? but still, do you guys think it's okay??  
> (i don't think i'm gonna change it in this chapter since it's up, but for future reference)


	5. Side Chapter: Collette!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's Collette's birthday!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw: none i can think of right now. (please tell me if there are)
> 
> and i think i commented to someone about structure for next chapter...yeah i forgot i had this chapter planned in my notes, so that thing is about the next *ahem* _actual_ chapter

Collette wakes up, feeling highly refreshed and absolutely ecstatic for today. Why? Because today is her birthday. Obviously.

She immediately runs over to Jen's room, jumping onto the bed and shaking her older sister awake. Said sister groans, taking one of her pillows and smacking the younger in the face.

"Jeeeeeeeeen! Wake up it's my birthdayyyyyyy!" Jen groans again, clearly not happy with waking up this early. Regardless, she sits up, rubbing her eyes awake.

"Okay okay, I'm awake." Once her face is fully functioning, the blonde looks at the brunette with a smirk upon her face. "So, who're we waking up first?" Collette takes no time to think about it, having decided the night prior.

"Vicki. Courtney would make us be quiet so Vicki wouldn't wake up." Jen nods, and the two mischief makers shuffle out of bed and run over to the first foster parent's room. "It's my birthdayyyyyy!" Collette yells out as she pounces on top of Vicki's sleeping body, while Jen jumps onto the bed next to Vicki and starts shaking her. Vicki jolts awake at this.

"Oh my- Shit!"

"Language, Vicki." Jen says in a snarky way, shaking her head. The adult in the room rolls her eyes, as she sits up. "Are you awake now?" 

"Yes, I am." After saying this, she gets a mischievous look upon her face, similar to the one the kids shared before coming here. "Now, what do you say, we go wake up Miss Grumpy Pants Courtney? Yeah?" The girls giggle at the nickname, knowing Courtney, like Grace, _hates_ being woken up. Though, she's still a lot more relaxed about it than Grace is.

The three, led by Vicki, quietly make their way over to the final bedroom. The leader creaks open the door, and the children can't help but giggle out of excitement. They tip toe over to the bed, and Vicki cues them in silently, holding up numbers.

One.....two......three........

"WAKE UP!" Vicki's knelt next to the bed, practically laughing her guts out at Courtney's reaction. Both Collette and Jen end up jumping onto Courtney, making her sit up as a reaction to the sudden weight.

After realizing that, no, there's no murderer in the house, Courtney motions for the two girls to get off of her. The orange girl reaches for her glasses, putting them on so she can properly see the little mischief makers who broke into her room.

She gives the teal girl a pointed look, knowing that she's the one who gave the kids that idea anyway. The other only gives a fake smile of innocence, causing Courtney to roll her eyes.

"Why in the world are you here?" Her main purpose of this question is to tease their foster kids. She knows exactly what today is, after all.

"Birthday! Duh!" Jen answers, missing the slight sarcasm in the previous question.

"Is it?" Courtney mockingly taps her chin to show she's thinking. This show is mostly for Collette, since Jen is two years older. (Though Vicki also seems to be enjoying her friend's antics) "Oh right, it _is_ someone's birthday. I just can't remember who...."

"It's mine!" Collette reminds with a laugh.

"No, no it can't be yours, you already had your birthday..."

"Courtney!! My birthday's todayyy!!" The youngest repeats, still laughing at her foster parent's confusion and denial.

"You know I'm just kidding, HAPPY BIRTHDAY COLLETTE!" The group piles in for birthday hugs, staying like that for a little bit before letting go. "Why don't we all get dressed so we can have breakfast? Don't put on your party clothes yet though."

The last statement is directed toward the children, and everyone nods at the plan. As Collette makes her way back to her room, a slight realization comes upon her.

It's also the day she was brought to Vicki and Courtney. It's an anniversary. A...Come-a-versary? Foster-a-versary? She'll have to ask Lina about a better name for it when she comes for the party.

So it's a double celebration. Her birthday, and the day Toby brought her to Vicki and Courtney. Well, that day was actually not the best...but now she has a life better than she had living with the others...

<> <> <>

She's lucky enough that these people kept her for this long. About......four months? That's a record. She thinks this because she's been in and out of foster homes for as long as she can remember.

She doesn't remember anything about her parents, just knows that her parents left her on some random person's doorstep when she was...two? Three? Probably two and a half. And that when the people of the house found her, they called the agency.

Whenever she calls it an agency, she always thinks she's on some secret spy mission. And, it kind of is. The workers bring 'kids in situations', as Toby calls it, to better places, and the only people who know about it, are the ones involved--almost no one at her school knows foster care exists.

Toby is the social worker who keeps bringing her to new foster homes. Usually, it's because they don't want her, or something happens to the adults that means she can't stay. Except this one time, Toby came to the house to check on her, and the people were about to hit her, when he opened the door. He ran in and told them off before leaving with Collette.

Anyway, said social worker comes to the house. It's one of those situations where they just don't want her, the girl overhears. Collette follows Toby to his car, not really hesitating to get in the backseat. It's just routine. She's used to people not wanting her.

(Actually, she's lucky that she hasn't had to move cities since she's started school.)

The driver talks about the new people she'll be staying with. Collette doesn't really pay attention to this conversation, it doesn't exactly matter if they're married, dating, two boys, two girls. It's all a blur because sooner or later, she's gone. However, one detail sticks out to her.

"They're new foster parents, so you'll be their first if that's alright." That's new. All the people she's stayed with have had experience. These...they're new. The detail excites her a bit before realizing that it's probably gonna be the same as before. So Collette just shrugs.

"It's fine." That's what she always says. Because why would this time be different? She continues to stare at the window, and Toby doesn't press any further, the two falling into a comfortable silence. Collette _has_ proposed that she just stay with Toby, but unfortunately Toby says there's not enough space in his flat. Bummer.

She ends up waiting at the agency. She's not in the 'alone room' where the really scared kids go. Since she's here so often, she's free to roam around the lobby until Toby comes to find her. There's a couple of others like her as well, but they're all from neighboring cities, so she doesn't know them.

A while later, Toby comes up to her with two women following, one with straight blonde hair, the other with curly brown hair. Just like always, Collette politely introduces herself.

"Hello, I'm Collette." The slightly shorter of the women does the introduction for the both of them.

"Hey Collette, I'm Courtney, and this is Vicki. It's nice to meet you." Good, they didn't kneel or bend over. But, they said 'it's nice to meet you', which is what everyone who ended up giving her up because they didn't want her said. She doubts these two will last very long. "How old are you?"

Collette actually has to think it over because....today is her birthday. How could she forget her birthday?? Is it because Toby came? Just because he came to pick her up doesn't give her a reason to forget it's her birthday. But then, that means she's getting relocated on her birthday. [Whoo](https://youtu.be/BhszM7II9p8?t=295).

"I'm s....seven. Today."

"Oh is today your birthday?" Vicki asks, Collette nodding as a response. The now seven year old swears she saw a flicker of pity in their eyes, but before she can fully process it, it's gone. A very interesting case, these two are.

She'll have to see what's up with them.

<> <> <>

Collette knows that Vicki and Courtney know it's her birthday, but she doesn't expect them to remember her Foster-a-versary (seriously, she needs Lina to help her come up with something better).

When she comes downstairs, Courtney is almost done making breakfast, and Vicki seems to be signing something at the dinner table. Jen isn't down yet.

"Hey Collette! Come here!" Collette walks over to the table at Vicki's beckoning. "Check it out, happy birthday!" The birthday girl smiles as she takes, what she now sees is a card, out of her caretaker's hands.

The front of it is designed like one of those Uno draw cards, except instead of two, it's a 'draw one'. This makes her chuckle quietly, specifically remembering the time she beat Courtney and chaos happened.

On the inside, the left side of the card shows an elephant holding a cake. The sight of her favorite animal in the unrealistic situation makes her giggle even more. On the right side is a bunch of hand-written messages and doodles from the others in the house.

> _Hey Coley! We haven't known each other for that long, but you're really the best little sister I could ever ask for! Love you! --Jen <3_
> 
> _Collette, you're an absolute gem! You are the sweetest little thing ever. Even if you kept shooting glares at me last year.. Wow, it's really been a year, huh? I love you so much, and I hope we can spend many more years with you! Happy birthday you little rascal ;) --Courtney_
> 
> _Heyo, it's a double celebration! Today you're not only getting a year older (which makes you 8. Stop growing.) but it also marks the completion of one year at Casa de la Chaos. You have no idea how excited I am for this. You're spectacular, and I'm glad you haven't given up on us hehe.. That probably means you'll be sticking with us for a long long time. Happy birthday Coles! Love you! --Vicki_

"I love it." Collette says before launching herself at Vicki, embracing her tightly. She doesn't see Jen taking a picture on Courtney's phone--the orange girl's still busy, after all. 

"I love you." As they pull apart, Vicki makes another remark. "Glad you still don't hate us to death." Laughter erupts from everyone at the memory. Even Jen, who's laughing because she can't see her sister hating _anyone_ that isn't Snitch and his crew.

<> <> <>

There's something off about these two. And not in the same way Collette felt with that one couple, no. There's definitely something different. What, Collette has no clue.

So as you do, she stares. She observes their every move, every interaction. She listens carefully to their conversations, which one might call eavesdropping, but Collette calls research. This is very important research, as a matter of fact.

They invite Toby to stay for lunch, which Collette has always ruled as 'trying too hard to please'. Her social worker isn't busy, so he ends up staying. Or, he can sense Collette skepticism, which is unlikely in the eyes of the seven year old.

Collette eats little, despite lunch being spaghetti, her favorite. Normally she'll skip the whole 'I don't trust you charade', but today, she takes it a step back. She wants to see the new foster parents' reaction.

All she gets is the silent treatment. Glances towards her plate, not a word mentioned about how much she's eaten. But no looks of pity or anything of the sort. Which is different. Why are they different?

The looks Vicki and Courtney receive from the child are...not happy ones. She looks rather...angry? She hasn't even been here for a day, and she already hates it here. Are they doing something wrong?

When they finish their meal, Collette is left to explore the house, which she does. She _could_ do more research, but she figures she'll give her new caregiver's a break from her staring.

"No one said that foster parenting was easy." Toby says, having noticed their worry. 

"Were we that obvious?" Vicki asks, Courtney silently agreeing.

"To me yes. But you shouldn't worry. Most foster kids are skeptical of moving into a new place. And Collette's been in and out of a lot of foster homes, so it'll take a while for her to open up. My advice is to just be patient. Don't take her stares to heart."

The teal and orange girls nod, mentally tucking that information to their memory. They don't notice a small pair of eyes _still_ watching and listening from the stairs, noting how they took the advice, and how the rest of their conversation goes.

Maybe she'll break her record of four months.

<> <> <>

It's almost lunchtime, meaning it's almost time for Collette's birthday party. Her birthday decorations are _supposed_ to be the Greatest Showman themed, but they couldn't find any decorations for that, so they had to be creative.

Everyone's now dressed in their party clothes. Vicki and Courtney are checking and making final touches when the doorbell rings.

Excited, Collette sprints to the door, quickly checking who it is before swinging the door open. As expected, Lina and her family are on the other side of the door. They _are_ the only guests, but that's mostly because it's still summer break, and she's closest to them anyway.

"Happy birthday Collette!" Collette runs up to hug Lina first, then Jane, and finally Anna. She waves to Cathy and Grace before dragging her friends inside to show them the party decorations.

Cathy puts the presents she's carrying next to the other unopened presents, since the children seem to be preoccupied, before following Grace to meet with the other half of their friend group.

The kids (finally) get to continue their game of Revolution. Lina and Collette's roles haven't changed, but since Anna died, she had to change characters, so now she's a general. Jane joined a bit late, but now she's a spy on Anna's side. And _maybe_ Jen can join too.

Or, Collette thinks they can play now.

"Wait one second." Lina says before running over to the kitchen, where the adults are. "Hey Courtney?" The girl in orange directs her attention to the seven year old, since she's not talking in the conversation. "Can we open presents? I got Collette something I hope we can use in our game."

She thinks about it for a second, before quickly asking the other adults for their opinions. With their confirmation, Courtney turns back to Lina.

"Yeah, I think we can do that, let's all go to the living room then." Lina smiles, and is about to run back to the room before a grumbling sound is heard. The foster parents laugh quietly at this. "Or..would you like to eat lunch first?"

"....Lunch." Lina quietly replies, blush very apparent on her cheeks. "But I'll go get the others myself."

"Okay Lina." Cathy says, still trying to hide her laughter. With that, Lina runs back, her sisters, friend, and Jen turning their heads towards her as she arrives.

"Why'd you take so long?" The birthday girl asks, as she was hoping to get as much playtime as she can before school starts again. (Why must they go to school?)

"Courtney says you can open presents after lunch. It's time to eat now." As if on cue, multiple stomachs start growling with hunger, causing the children to laugh. Anna then runs off towards the table.

"Race ya!" The kids all start running after the youngest of them, following the tempting smells of food. Jen unsurprisingly wins, with Anna surprisingly getting there second. Lina reaches the table third, followed by Collette and lastly Jane.

Everyone sits at the table, happy and content. A big difference from Collette's birthday last year. This is something she'll get used to.

_Happy Birthday Collette!_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a lil sweet chapter for u guys, ft. Vicki, Courtney, and fam!


	6. First Day of School!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> School starts once again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw: none i can think of (tell me if there are)
> 
> and before we start, may i just say that all the comments i've been getting....AHHHHHH srsly u guys make me so fucking flustered i can't take compliments for the life of me i stg y'all make me a blubbering mess. i've gone back to my habit of replying to all comments bc u guys r just that great :)  
> tysm for all the positive comments! i love u all! <3
> 
> enjoy another mini chapter!

School. Oh boy, they're going back to school. School with homework, and projects, and..... _Snitch_. Ugh. Lina _prays_ that she isn't stuck with _Snitch_ in her class. Again. Jane hopes that she can fit in well enough at school, coming from homeschool after all. Anna hopes she doesn't mess up her English and gets laughed at. Plus, it's her first time going to school _at all_.

But negatives aside, the girls are pretty excited to go back to school. Instead of going through it alone, they'll have each other, despite being in different grades. Plus, Cathy and Grace won't have to switch off shifts for their jobs anymore.

On meet-and-greet day, the girls meet their teachers.

Lina is polite as ever, introducing herself just as she always does. She's bold enough to tell the teacher that if Snitch is in the class (though, she uses his _actual_ name when asking), that they will NOT be able to get along. Her teacher laughs and says that he isn't, but that she should be able to keep him in line anyway, then winks. Lina likes this teacher.

Jane is a bit hesitant to talk to her new teacher. She introduces herself so quietly that her teachers asks her to speak up. As mentioned before, she's transferring to public school from homeschool. She's lucky that her teacher explains how public school works, and what their day is going to look like in general. Now public school doesn't seem that bad.

At first Anna starts to walk towards the exit, proposing they get ice cream, before she's redirected to the kindergarten classrooms. Oh. She has school now. Right.

Anna hides behind Cathy, squeezing her hand tightly. She doesn't speak at all, so Grace introduces the five year old for her. It's a completely new side of Anna, shy, introverted, and quiet. However, her teacher seems to be understanding, lowering their volume to not spook their new student. Anna's invited to look about the classroom and she doesn't leave Cathy's side, but she's definitely excited for school to start now.

The group exits the school, Anna once again proposing they get ice cream, and Cathy and Grace agreeing to it. As they all snack on their frozen treat, the kids talk about their hopes for the next school year.

On the first day of school, it takes a bit of convincing to get everyone up. Convincing meaning going around the house banging pots together.

"Girls, you slept through your alarms, get up! Let's go!" The three kids (and Cathy) jump at the sudden clatter, groaning from tiredness. That is, until they realized they're going to be late if they don't get their butts out the door in 10 minutes. Classic.

Frantic, the girls (and Cathy) jump out of bed, running to the closest to put their uniforms (or in Cathy's case, work clothes) and quickly brushing their teeth before hurrying downstairs. Grace is waiting for them, holding out one toaster waffle for each of the children to eat in the car. Cathy comes down last, and starts to run towards the kitchen before she's pulled away by Grace.

"I need-"

"Get some at work caffeine addict." Cathy throws up her hands in defeat as she runs after the girls, who have grabbed their backpacks and are now putting on their shoes. "Come on, we're gonna be late, let's go." Shoes on and everything accounted for, the five run out of the house and into the car (Cathy obviously locking the door first).

Grace breathes out a sigh, seeing that everyone is in the car and they're now on the road. The schoolgirls munch on their short breakfast as they wait to arrive for the first day of school.

Pulling into the drop-off in front of the school, Lina, Anna, and Jane have now finished their waffles, and are now unbuckling their seatbelts and putting their backpacks on. Jane, who's on the right side, closest to the school, opens the door, and all three girls file out of the car.

"Bye Cathy! Bye Grace!" The three say their goodbyes before walking into the school, Anna holding hands with both of her sisters. (Jane gently squeezed her hand, while Lina pretended to be annoyed)

Anna is the first one to part from the group. Lina and Jane walk Anna towards the kindergarten classes, and it takes a bit of convincing to get her to go by herself.

"Anna, you were really excited yesterday." Jane reminds, trying not to think about the fact that it's also her first day. "It's going to be okay." The five year old turns back to her older sisters, to see them giving her encouraging smiles. She smiles back, giving them a tight hug.

"Bye Lina! Bye Jane!" Anna calls out before running off to her class. She walks into her classroom, greeting her teacher in the process.

"Hello Anna! Do you remember where you sit?" The girl nods, still a bit shy around her new teacher. "Alright, go on inside then." Anna obeys, putting her backpack in her cubby and taking out her new Pokemon pencil--a good luck present from Cathy and Grace.

She walks over to her table. There aren't any boys at her table (which according to Lina is a good thing) but there's a table full of boys right next to them.

The five year old sits in her seat, fiddling with her pencil. It's a bit strange for her, being this quiet. But overall, being in a new environment can change one's behavior, even if for a short while.

A few seconds after she sits down, the other girls at her table turn to her, waving with sweet smiles. It's with this that her shell is broken. She feels confident enough that she can make conversation like the outgoing girl she is.

"Hi, I'm Veronica. That's Martha, and that's Betty." Anna smiles and waves back.

"I'm Anna." The kindergartener sticks to short sentences to avoid making mistakes in speaking that would cause people to laugh. But of course, her accents would give it away anyway.

"Why does your voice sound weird?" Thankfully, the question doesn't come from the girls at her table. But unfortunately it comes from the boys at the table next to them. "You sound funny." This is just what Anna was afraid of. Embarrassed, she ducks her head down, proceeding to fiddle with her pencil once again.

"That's mean! It's not her fault!" Anna perks her head up to see that Veronica is standing up for her, Martha and Betty nodding along. "I think she sounds cool!" Anna can see that the teacher was about to come over to stop the teasing, but seems to change his mind as the boys turn away from them.

"But, why _do_ you sound like that?" Betty asks. This time, it doesn't feel accusatory like the kids at the other table, but rather curious, and honestly a bit cautious as well. So, Anna feels comfortable explaining.

"I....moved here from Germany. I had to learn English over the summer." Anna leaves out the 'my Papa put me in a box and shipped me here' part, not knowing how these girls would react to hearing that. Speaking of which, Anna's table-mates nod in understanding.

"Cool! We can be your first friends!" Anna decides to leave out that she lives with Lina and Jane for now as well. But that's a minor detail. Because she's just made three friends before class even started. This won't be as bad as she thought.

~ ~ ~

Jane is second to go to class, nothing more than a minute's walk from the kindergarten classes. 

"I'm scared." Jane didn't expect her to admit that to Lina, but the thought of it is so overbearing that the blonde just can't help herself. 

"It'll be fine." Lina reassures. "Everyone says Ms. Hamilton is the nicest teacher ever. I wish I had her last year." The younger of the two smiles, also remembering how nicely her teacher had answered her questions. Taking a deep breath, she nods.

"Okay." The two share a quick hug before parting. "Bye Lina!" Lina waves back before walking away towards her own classroom. Jane takes another deep breath. She must look a bit silly standing still in the middle of the hallway.

So she starts walking towards Ms. Hamilton's classroom. When walking into the group of classrooms, she forgets which one is hers for a second. Thankfully Ms. Hamilton is standing in the doorway and waves to her, so Jane briskly walks over.

"Hi Jane! Do you remember what to do?" Jane's eyes widen a bit, slightly panicking that she can't recall the instructions, but her teacher just smiles, patiently explaining. "It's alright darling. Just put your backpack in your cubby and then find your seat, okay?" The first grader nods, then walks inside to do as she's told.

At first she forgets where she's supposed to be sitting, but then one girl walks over to her.

"Hi! Are you Jane?" She doesn't know how this girl knows who she is, but she nods. She really hope this isn't like the Playground Incident™. "Cool! You sit at our table up front." She grabs her hand and starts pulling her towards the table. The sudden movement shocks Jane, but at least she's learning where her spot it. "You sit right here."

"Th-thank you." Jane says, still very shy. There's only one other girl at her table, and she seems to know the one who brought her here."

"I'm Alana, by the way. That's my best friend Zoe. You can be our friend too! There's only three of us at this table, so we can all be best friends. We're the only table with three people and-"

"Lana, I think you're scaring her." Jane lets out a small breath she didn't know she was holding. Alana talks a lot, but she's glad Zoe's a bit more quiet, and that she noticed that she _was_ feeling a bit uncomfortable at the rambling. "Sorry, she does that a lot." Zoe apologizes, her voice much quieter than the other's.

"It's okay."

"I didn't see you here last year. Did you move?" Zoe asks, and Jane shakes her head in response. She's still a bit very shy, but at least she has some possible friends now.

"I was homeschooled." Her table-mates make an 'oh' with their mouths. "I'd like to be your friend....if that's okay..." The six year old trails off, hoping she's not coming on too strongly. (Though she doesn't think that title could be taken from anyone except Alana)

"Yay!" Alana exclaims, before being shushed by Zoe. This makes Jane smile. This is better than homeschool.

~ ~ ~

Lina is last to arrive to her class. By last, she means last out of her sisters. She walks into her classroom, greeting her teacher nicely and putting her backpack in her cubby. 

She looks over to the table she's been assigned and sees Chloe....she's not that bad she supposes, an empty chair and....

"Hey Collette!!" Lina is happy to see that her friend is in the same class _and_ table as her, _and_ Snitch isn't here. This might prove to be the best school year ever.

"Linaaa!" The two friends share a hug. Lina takes the seat in between Collette and Chloe. She's arrived just in time for her teacher to start class.

"Good morning everyone!" The class greets her back. "I'm Ms. Schuyler, it's nice to meet you." About half the class answers back with 'it's nice to meet too's. "Okay, why don't we-" Their teacher is interrupted by the phone ringing. "Okay guys and gals, I need to take that. You can talk while I answer it."

Everyone starts out silent from the suspense of the phone call, but soon whispers start to arise, and from that, the volume rises to normal talking.

Lina and Collette also make small talk (don't worry, Chloe was talking with her friend at the next table over). Which somehow turns into eavesdropping on the teacher's conversation.

"And which student?........oh, okay.....alright.......oh, she's also in this class...yeah, I'll tell Lina, of course.." Lina and Collette share a look. What did this have to do with Lina? Is she in trouble? No, it's the first day of school. Plus, the teacher was also talking about another student.

Ms. Schuyler glances at the two of them, who quickly pretend to be talking about something and totally not listening to the phone call. She focuses back to the phone call.

"Yeah....why don't you send her here now?.....huh?.....ok, i'll just grab Lina then." The two foster kids share another look with each other. Lina's leaving? Why? Is she leaving? Wait, they keep forgetting about the other student. 

So Lina has some connection with this other student who's coming into their class. The seven year old looks around the classroom--there aren't any empty seats except the one at her table. So the new-maybe-not-new kid will be sitting at her table.

"Lina." Collette tells her friend to come closer so they can whisper. "What if it's another foster kid?" Lina's eyes widen. She hadn't thought about that. Them being in the foster system has been a secret between the two of them (and Anna and Jane). Plus, Cathy and Grace already have three foster kids and they are a _lot_ to handle. Lina doesn't get a chance to reply because the teacher hangs up and walks over to their table.

"Hey Lina, I need you to come with me, okay?" Lina gives one last look to Collette before nodding at the teacher. "Okay, let's go." Ms. Schuyler tells the class not to destroy the room (which was funny) while she's gone, but one of the counselors comes in to watch over them anyway.

Lina follows the teacher to the principal's office. There's the principal, a _police officer_ , and-

Anne Boleyn.

Oh crap.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oop guess who's next?
> 
> (and side note: school can be fucking stressful--i've wanted to cry about three times because of some dumb essay, but i haven't and idk if that's good or not. but that aside, how's everyone? i hope ur doing better than i am hehe. if u are, that's great! you've made me happy! if not, we can sulk together. sending hugs to everyone! <(^_^)>


	7. Anne

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Meet, Anne!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw: gun violence, murder/death, implied emotional abuse (i think, not sure on that one)
> 
> also, i've stopped putting the translations in the end notes, cuz i'm sure yall r using translate in the middle of it anyway sooo yea
> 
> OMG GUYS THE FIC PASSED 1000 HITS AS I WAS WRITING THIS CHAP I AM SHOOKETH AHH

She remembers them telling her she _has_ to go to school. That she has to leave her behind. But last time she did that, people got hurt. _He_ got hurt. She doesn't know if she got hurt, but there's a high chance she did.

She isn't going to let _anyone_ hurt her. Not now, not ever. Never.

(・_・ ) (・_・ ) (・_・ )

There are three questions going on in Lina's head right now. One, why is _Anne Boleyn_ in her class? Two, why is she with a _police officer_? And three, what does _she_ have to do with _Anne Boleyn_ and a _police officer_?

"Hello Anne." Lina's voice is cold, she doesn't dare show emotion around _Anne Boleyn_. And Anne does the same.

"Catalina." The adults in the room share some glances, not expecting that they knew each other. Well, except the principal, the two having been involved with a situation last year.....

"Okay, since it seems you two already know each other..." Ms. Schuyler starts. "Lina, you're going to be Anne's buddy for the day." Buddies? Her and _Anne Boleyn_? She really hopes she's dreaming, but sadly, she is not.

"Do I have to?" Lina whispers. 

"Yes. You two are going to become...closer than you think." Lina (and Anne, who had been listening) are confused at the statement. Closer? What does that mean? And with _her_? Funny.

"Fine." Is all Lina says, and she, her teacher, and ugh, Anne Boleyn, walk back to the classroom. Anne's hand shakes the entire way. She recalls the events prior to arriving at the school. She shouldn't be here. She needs to go find her. She needs to make sure she's safe. She needs to protect her.

When the group turns a corner, Anne, who had been trailing from the back and far away from Lina, sneaks off in the other direction. She avoids all the teachers and staff with ease, having gotten lots of practice before. Before, with them, avoiding _him_.

She doesn't want to think about it, but she can't help herself. The memory rushes back, and the need to go find her increases. Anne sneakily exits the school through one of the side doors, creeping around the building to the front, because she'll know where to go from there.

Her back faced to the school, she turns right. And she really _really_ hopes she's safe. Her little Kitty.

Meanwhile, a little bit after the trio became a duo, Lina notices the lack of a pair of footsteps walking behind her. So she looks back, and the girl is nowhere to be seen. The two stop.

No doubt causing trouble, she thinks to herself. Ms. Schuyler on the other hand takes out her walkie talkie (which, how come teachers get to use those? It's not fair.) and phones in the principal, informing them of the situation.

Lina tugs at her educator's sleeve, pointing in the direction of the classrooms to silently ask if she can walk back herself. She must really trust the seven year old a lot, because she gives her a thumbs up. The schoolgirl gives a nod of thanks before walking back to the classroom by herself.

So much drama has happened today, and it's only the first day of school. Usually first days of school you play a bunch of 'get to know you' games, which are okay, but better than doing schoolwork. She can't wait to tell Collette, and subsequently Anna and Jane before finally her foster parents, Cathy and Grace.

As you do, the class turns towards the door as Lina walks in, before murmurs start to rise due to the lack of a teacher. Seeing her friend's return, Collette eagerly waves her over.

"Lina. What happened?" She asks as Lina sits back in her seat. But just as Lina starts to tell the story, Ms. Schuyler walks into the classroom, the counselor now leaving.

"Ok class, nothing happened that you need to worry about." When she glances at Lina, the second grader knows that she's still involved in this.

And that it isn't going to end soon.

~ ~ ~

As they wait in front of the school for Cathy and Grace, the foster kids (minus Collette, who had already been picked up with Jen) talk about their day, Lina going last because of everything that happened not even before class started.

"Girls!" At the sound of Grace's voice, the three run up to the car, filing into the backseat. Anna sits in the middle, with Lina on her left, and Jane on her right. "How was your first day of school?"

"Grace cried." The schoolgirls giggle at Cathy's comment as Grace proceeds to playfully hit her arm before pulling out of the drop-off. 

"It's a touching moment." The girl in black mumbles. "Anyway, school! How was it?" The kids go in the same order they did while waiting, youngest to oldest. However, in the middle of Lina's story, the brunette trails off, noticing that this isn't their street. They'd be home by now.

"Grace, where're we going?" In the mirror, Grace purses her lips, glancing at Cathy so that _she_ can answer.

"Ummm, we're headed to the agency-"

"Again?!" The youngest of them interrupts, her mouth gaping. She thought that having three foster kids was a lot. They're getting more now? She hopes that Cathy and Grace don't get too stressed, but she _really_ wants a younger sister. Being the youngest is hard.

"Yes..." Cathy answers, feeling a bit guilty because of the sudden, and seemingly negative, response. "As far as we know, they might not stay with us permanently like the three of you." They. That could mean multiple things. Determining which one is like taking the first turn in a game of memory.

So how is this going to turn out?

Meanwhile, at the agency, Anne pouts over the fact that the adults at the daycare called the social workers the moment she walked in. She had them on speed dial.

All Anne was trying to do is make sure that Kitty is safe. Who knows when they're going to turn on you? Anyone could turn at any given point in time, and she will _not_ take that chance again.

Her younger step-sister is curled in her lap, both of them content with sitting there and watching all the workers and other foster kids walk by. They don't remember how long they've been there, but it doesn't matter since both of them are here, together. If only it could be the three of them.

Suddenly, Kitty perks her head up at something.

"Kitty?" Without warning, the younger of the siblings run off towards who or whatever caught her eye. "Kitty come back!" Anne runs after her sister. She can't have her getting into trouble. She needs to be able to see her. "Kitty you can't run off....like.....that..." Anne finishes her sentence a bit more slowly as she catches up with Kitty.

Kitty has stopped in front of a group of girls. Anne doesn't recognize any of them besides two. Ugh, _Catalina Aragon_. And-

"Janey!" Kitty runs up to the blonde and gives her a hug, while Anne just stands there, arms crossed and watching the interaction. Anne knows that Jane won't hurt her sister. But that doesn't mean that she has to like her.

"K-Kitty?" Jane is shocked at the sudden appearance of her cousin. And she knows that her younger cousin never goes anywhere without, "Anne?"

"Hello Jane." To be frank, Anne didn't expect Jane to be here. Her parents are perfect. She's perfect. Why is she in a building for messed up kids? "Fancy seeing you here." At the sound of her voice, the social worker who brought her and Kitty here speaks up.

"Oh hello Anne. We were just about to come get you." For what reason? To take Kitty away? Not again. She can't do that again. "This is Cathy and Grace. You'll be staying with them until we get the two of you sorted out."

"Because we're messed up. Right?" Anne holds Kitty close to her as she walks back to her. Lucy purses her lips, mentally scolding herself for the poor choice of words.

"No, you're not. I mean that you'll stay with them until we know what the safest place for you is." Huh. _Funny_. How does Anne know that she can trust these people? She trusted _him_ and.....and.....bad things happened.

Lucy tries to ignore the glare she gets from Anne, and the anxious glances from Kitty. Thankfully one of the children saves them from having a lull in the conversation.

"Hi, I'm Anna. I'm five." The five year old steps in front, waving in a friendly manner. "That's Lina, she's seven. And this is Jane, she's six." Five. So everyone's older than Kitty. That could serve as a potential threat. But maybe if she can get Anna on her side, then she can keep the _other two_ in line. She _is_ two years younger, so convincing her should be easy.

"Cool." Anne decides to leave out the details until later. When she can talk to her in private. With Kitty of course. She won't leave her alone again. "I'm Anne. This is my sister Katherine. She goes by Kitty." Anna nods, before smiling and waving to Kitty. The youngest of them all doesn't respond, just clings to her older sister and stares.

Jane is still trying to wrap her head around the idea that her cousins are here. Well, Kitty is kind of her step cousin because she and Anne are step siblings. And on the occasion that they'd visit her house, their family always seemed put together. She wonders what happened to them that they're now foster kids. And where are their other siblings?

Lina is trying to find some escape from the truth. Keyword: trying. The reality is, she's going to be living in the same house as _Anne Boleyn_. She's going to have the same foster parents as _Anne Boleyn_. She's going to be _sisters_ with _Anne Boleyn_.

Actually, scratch that. Because they don't _have_ to be siblings if Lina doesn't want to. She refers to Jane and Anna as her sisters because she likes them. And she doesn't like _Anne Boleyn_. So she won't be sisters. And she supposes that would go the same for her sister, but maybe a little less since she's probably younger than Anna.

"Don't tell me _she's_ coming home with us." Lina says a bit loudly. So much is happening today. And it's only the _first day of school_. Wow.

"It's okay Chaton." The adults hear Anne whisper to Kitty, who, they now see, had flinched at Lina's raised voice. The older sister picks up her younger one before turning her attention to her known enemy. "Could you not? Kitty hates it when people raise their voice."

Cathy and Grace notice how Anne keeps a more hushed tone, to not contradict her previous statement. They also take note of the glare that gets sent their way, as if their new (possible, as there's still a case involved) foster kid is telling them as a warning.

Well, now they understand she's more like Lina, in being skeptical about the transition, and them in general. Which is fine. As they've learned from experience (though mostly from Vicki and Courtney if they're being honest), they should just trust that she and Kitty will trust them eventually.

"Why don't head home now?" The kids nod, Anne and Kitty's reaction being more reluctant, though that is to be expected.

Upon arriving at the car, Cathy and Grace have a bit of an issue with the number of seats. Because of the glares that Anne and Lina are sending each other, and the fact that taking them onto the bus would probably be a bad idea, the blue girl comes up with a solution.

Kitty sits on Anne's lap, behind Cathy. Anna sits in Lina's lap behind Grace. Jane is in the middle partially because Kitty seems to be less anxious around her, but mostly so Lina and Anne don't kill each other. (Wait, that's a poor choice of words. Attack might help, though trigger words are still something the family is figuring out)

The car ride is now silent, the topic of 'first day of school' having been used, and no other topics have been brought up.

The tension is high, and Cathy can't seem to figure out why.

When they arrive home, Anne makes sure not to let go of Kitty's hand. The younger doesn't mind, she doesn't want to let go anyway. The group enters the house, words finally being spoken.

"Uh, Anne. We only have one other room available, I hope you're okay with sharing." Grace leads them upstairs, while the others head to the living room. She opens the door to the green room. 

"It's fine. I want to share with Kitty." This statement doesn't surprise the girl in black--Anne seems to be wary of them, and does seem to be protective over her sister. So she nods. 

Actually, at their old house, Anne made sure that she had her own room. She likes having her own space, so she didn't want any of her siblings getting in. Not even her twin. But...since _it_ happened, Anne never wants to leave Kitty again. She didn't know at first that she had gotten hurt, but now she's sure of it. And it had been her fault, so she's going to make up for it.

"Green." A small voice says as she gently pokes Anne, knowing green is her favorite color. It's the first time that Grace hears Kitty's voice, shocked at how little she sounds. Well, she means, she knew Kitty was younger than Anna, but this just confirmed it. 

"Yeah. I like green." Anne replies.

"Pink?" Pink is Kitty's favorite color, so naturally, she'd want some in their room. Grace notices the quietness and the shortness of the youngest's sentences, and makes a decision based on hers and Cathy's want for all of their girls to trust them.

"We can get some pink in here if you want. We should probably get an extra bed in here as well..." Grace offers, to which a pair of two small eyes light up at the suggestion, and turn to silently ask her role model for permission.

"That sounds good....no conditions though." The foster parent doesn't understand what the child means by 'no conditions'. Could it be something from their situation? Either way, Grace figures that she should answer back.

"Alright then."

~ ~ ~

It's a couple days after Anne and Kitty's arrival at the foster home. Cathy and Grace don't expect either to open up, but they do wonder why neither of them have spoken to the other children.

Anne has _finally_ agreed to let Kitty stay at the daycare while she's at school. There had been some negotiating, and the consensus was that Anne go to school, and Kitty to daycare. But, if a situation comes up with Kitty, Anne can leave school to go see her right away.

She hasn't told anyone _why_ she's suddenly protective over her sister, but she had been assured that nothing would happen to her since there are other kids there too. She just wants her to be safe.

Anyway, today's Monday, after school, after everyone's changed out of their uniforms, and Anne decides that today's a good day to get her plan into motion. 

Anne, and subsequently Kitty, start to look around the house for the red girl. The two find her in her room, playing with her transformers. The green girl knocks on the door to let her and Kitty's presences be known (unlike a certain _someone_ ) before fully entering the bedroom.

"Hi Anne! Hi Kitty!" The seven year old among them waves before sitting in front of the five year old, the youngest of them following suit, without a word. 

"Can I ask you something, Anna?" The black-haired girl isn't expecting that to come from her mouth. If they needed something why not ask Cathy or Grace? Or even Lina, since she's been here longest. Not her. 

"Sure." Regardless of her thought process, she answers with an affirmative.

"You're close with Catalina and Jane, right?" Why Anne refers to Lina with her full name, Anna doesn't know. Actually, she doesn't know why Anne's asking about both of them in the first place.

"Uh, yeah. They're my sisters. Well, not really, but still sisters." It takes a moment for Anne to fully register what Anna says, but the answer is just what Anne was predicting.

"Ok. Well, you know Kitty's my sister." Anna nods, remembering their introductions. Upon hearing her name, Kitty squeezes Anne's hand before curling into her side. "She means a lot to me, and I don't want her to get hurt. I mean, she's only four. You understand, right?" 

Anna nods again. Although Lina and Jane are technically older than her, she wants to do what she can to protect them. Example being the Playground Incident™. And well, technically Anne and Kitty are going to be her sisters too, so...

"Yeah. And I don't want Kitty getting hurt either. She's like my younger sister now." Anne is a bit confused at how quick Anna is to trust people. They've only been in the house for a couple days and she's already calling them sisters. Well, Anne had been similar, though not through a couple days. And that didn't turn out well for her.

In a way, she hopes that Anna will learn not to trust people too quickly sooner than later.

"Well, I was wondering if you could keep an eye on Catalina and Jane for me." Anna tilts her head, puzzled. 

"Why?"

"Because they hate me. Or, some stuff happened before that made us not like each other anymore." The kindergartner is even more bewildered. She didn't know Anne knew Lina and Jane--no one said anything about knowing anyone, especially not hating anyone. "I don't want them to hurt Kitty because they don't like me."

Oh. Well, that makes sense. And it also doesn't make sense. It makes sense that Anne would be scared for Kitty. But also, Lina and Jane wouldn't actively look to hurt someone.

Anne watches as her junior thinks it through. She's been one to both plan things out, and act sporadically. And when she plans, she thinks it through _hard_. And so, she's pretty confident in what the ending result will be.

"Okay. I can do that."

Just as she predicted.

What she didn't predict is that she'd end up closer to Anna. That wasn't part of her plan. Her plan was to get Anna on her side, have her watch Lina and Jane, then go back to observing everyone from afar.

Yet here she is, only seven days after arriving at Cathy and Grace's house, playing video games with Anna. For the third time this week. She isn't cautious about Anna being so close to Kitty. She isn't scared. Well, part of that might've come from her age, but still.

She's seated in between the two, since Kitty still freaks out a bit if someone other than Anne (and Jane, but Kitty's been following around Anne, who's been avoiding Jane).

"Nana." Anna turns her head towards her little sister (she doesn't call her that out loud yet, but she's still excited that she's no longer the youngest) at the sound of the nickname she's been given. Kitty holds out one of the crackers she's been eating, offering one to her.

"Thanks Kitty." She replies, taking the cracker from the four year old's hand and sticking it in her mouth. With that, Anne feels herself relax. Because Anna's not so bad.

Yeah, she can trust Anna.

~ ~ ~

Two days later, Cathy and Grace approach Jane. Jane is one of two people that Anne (and subsequently Kitty) have been avoiding like the plague. (Not like they haven't been avoiding Cathy and Grace. They'll cooperate and talk, but to the bare minimum. With Jane and Lina, they try not to make contact at all)

"Jane, can we talk?" Cathy asks after helping Jane with an art project she'd been working on, causing the latter's eyes to widen. "Nothing bad, I promise." The blue girl clarifies, easing the almost-immediate tension that had built up in the blonde.

"We just want to ask you something." Grace chimes in, taking a seat across from Jane. "You don't have to answer if you're not comfortable." The child at the table nods.

"Okay."

"How come you and Anne are avoiding each other?" Jane fixes her gaze on the in-progress project in front of her, pursing her lips. After a moment, she starts to speak.

"I'm not avoiding her, she's avoiding me. W-we're cousins..." She trails off, waiting for a response, but at the lack of one, she quietly continues. "S-something happened and now she hates me."

"Do you hate her?" Cathy gently asks, knowing that hate is a strong word, and that Jane isn't one to put it likely.

"N-not really... But she won't talk to me." The writer sighs, recalling moments where Jane had clearly tried to talk to her, only to be ignored by her older cousin.

"Well, we can fix that." The six year old is confused for a bit before Grace calls up the stairs (not to the point of yelling though, that being a trigger for a couple of the kids). "Anne! Can you come down, please?" A bit of shuffling is heard before two pairs of feet walk down the stairs.

"Yeah?" Upon arriving at the table, Anne realizes that _Jane Seymour_ is there. She crosses her arms. The green girl knows exactly what this is, and she won't have it. Just because Jane is perfect doesn't mean everyone has to make _her_ perfect.

Grace motions for Anne (and Kitty) to come take a seat at the table. The seven year old takes the seat to Grace's right, pulling her sister into her lap and eyeing the adults at the table.

"We want you to talk to Jane. She's been trying to talk to you, but you keep shunning her out, and...I think it's time you do it now, okay?" Well. Anne wasn't expecting that. Yet, at the same time, she knew this day was coming, so without making eye contact, the second grader nods. "Thanks. We'll be in the kitchen if you need us."

As soon as they're out of ear shot and eye sight, Anne rolls her eyes. She doesn't want to talk to _Jane Seymour_. And what is _so_ important that she _has_ to talk to her? Anne feels a tug on her sleeve.

"Go Janey?" The oldest of the trio sighs. Kitty doesn't hold a grudge against their cousin, only sending glances because she looks up to her older sister so much. Of course she wants to go over to her. Well, maybe this once.

"Sure." Anne gives the pink girl a small smile as she puts her down. In return, Kitty gives her a beaming smile before walking over to Jane's side of the table and holding her arms out. The silver girl glances toward Anne, not wanting to do anything she wouldn't want--she's very protective over Kitty after all. "It's fine, Jane."

Jane isn't completely convinced, but no one can really say no to Kitty, so she pulls the four year old into her lap. After that exchange, there's an awkward silence that follows.

The blonde has things she wants to say, but how should she put it? How does she bring it up?

The black-haired girl stares. She's starting to get annoyed at the silence. Jane's wanted to talk to her for a while, so why doesn't she just say it?

"Um, so....about that night..." Jane starts, focusing her attention on Kitty, who's cuddling into her, and not Anne, who's probably glaring at her intensely. 

"What about it?" Anne knows which night she's thinking about. And she despises every second of it.

"Um...I-I just...want to know w-what I did w-wrong.....t-that made you hate me......" Jane trails off, immediately going into the submissive behavior that her parents had made her be.

"You didn't _do_ anything wrong." Anne bitterly replies. She isn't even aware of it. How dumb could one be?

"I-I didn't?"

"Yes! That's the point!" The Anne argues, throwing her hands up in the air. She then takes a deep breath so she can calm herself to lower her volume for Kitty's sake. "How do you not see it?" She asks, putting emphasis on each word. "Everyone thinks you're perfect." Jane gives her older cousin a look of confusion.

"But-"

"Let me finish." Pursing her lips, the first grader nods. "Everyone thinks you're amazing so my parents kept saying to be like you. All the time, it's 'be more like Jane'. Or, 'Jane never did that'. Or whatever! You never _do_ anything wrong." Anne swallows hard at the memories of her (step) dad yelling at her (and her siblings) whenever she did something 'improper'. "So when I broke the glass and you stood up to clean it without being told to...I just had enough."

"But you just sat there while he yelled at you." Jane mentions, bringing up her own memory of that dinner. "You didn't even cry."

"'Cause they don't care anyway. Not like you'd understand, you're family's perfect. I don't even know why you're here in the first place." Jane looks at Anne for the first time. She seems to be unfazed, but if one looked closely, they'd notice the glossiness of her eyes.

"....Whenever you left, my father hit me..." Jane decides to tell Anne why she's here, having been told that if your parents hit you a lot it's bad. She isn't sure where the urge to contradict the statement came from, but she hopes that it's for the better. "And if I cried, he always said 'Anne doesn't cry, so why don't you?'."

Anne's current expression is one like a fish. Her mouth opens and closes, not knowing how to react. Suddenly the image of a perfect girl and perfect family doesn't fit Jane anymore. They have something in common? Anne always thought they were opposites. Perfect and wrong. That was her world then. But what is her world now? 

Her eyes flicker to the one person she feels the need to protect. Kitty. Of course. Her world is now Kitty. Keeping her safe. And as much as she looks up to her, Anne knows that Kitty also looks up to Jane an immense amount as well.

"Huh." Is what she begins with. She takes a moment to think of how to put her thoughts to words. "We....have more in common than I thought." Jane nods, before following Anne's gaze towards the youngest of them all, who has fallen asleep just in time for her nap. "I'm sorry I avoided you. I was mad because everyone compared me to you, and I thought you still hated me, so I thought you might hurt Kitty." Jane shakes her head vigorously.

"No! I'd never hurt Kitty!" She assures, wincing at how loud her voice had gotten when Anne shushes her. "But, it's okay. I'm sorry I made you think that way." After a few seconds, Anne nods, giving a small smile to her cousin--which is gladly returned. "Are we good now?"

Jane's never done anything wrong. And she really cares about Kitty. She loves the girl a lot (but never as much as Anne does).

So yeah, she can trust Jane again.

"We're good."

~ ~ ~

Four days after that exchange, Anne (and again, Kitty) has become more open in general. Of course, if she interacts with anyone willingly, it'd be Kitty, Anna, or Jane. She'll still interact with Cathy and Grace with immense caution, but she seems to be closed off against Lina even more (if that's even possible). 

All the children are playing in the living room when a crash is heard. Cathy and Grace run towards the clatter to make sure no one is hurt. Thankfully no one did, but there's clearly a form of panic amongst the children upon their arrival.

"Anne made me do it." Immediate accusation from Lina, while Jane, Anna, and Kitty choose to remain silent for this encounter. Plus, none of them actually _saw_ who _really_ did it.

"No I didn't! Lina pushed me into it." Cathy picks up the broken object. It's a picture frame with them along with their foster kids. They always took a new photo once the newest got comfortable in their household, so Anne and Kitty aren't in the photo yet (along with the uncertainty of them permanently staying.

She sighs, seeing how happy they all are, and the clear tension in the room now. She has a feeling the other kids don't want to accuse because they don't want either to get into trouble. And then Lina and Anne are just....

No. Enough is enough. She doesn't want to intrude too much that it's uncomfortable with them, but this...how does she put it? Crossed the line? That makes it sound like she's about to yell at them, which she isn't, but there's a lack of a better term.

They need to put their differences aside and resolve...whatever it is that made them like this. Grace, who had noticed the gears turning in her best friend's mind, puts the bickering on hold.

"That's enough." The two second graders stop their arguing, (reluctantly) turning their attention to the adults in the room. "Cathy?" The blue girl takes that as her cue.

"I think there's been enough bickering, yeah?" The younger children quickly nod, while the oldest two bow their heads in guilt. "Okay. Now since we don't know who did it, the both of you are going to sit on this couch until you apologize. Everyone else needs to leave these two alone."

After a moment, everyone slowly starts to nod--well, except for one.

"No. I need to stay with Kitty. She can't be in another room without me." Right. The thought hadn't crossed her mind yet, and Cathy's mentally slapping herself for forgetting such an obvious claim that Anne would make. Thankfully, Grace already has that situation covered. She leans down to Kitty, making sure to keep her distance as well as lowering her voice.

"Kitty darling, Anne's going to be a bit busy for a while, okay? Do you think you could stay with Jane and Anna for a bit?" Kitty squeezes her big sister's hand, then looks to her for her opinion.

Anne breathes an exasperated sigh before nodding, knowing she won't be able to get out of this as much as she wants to. And even though she had just made up with Jane, and just met Anna, she feels she can trust them enough that they won't do anything bad to her.

But as she thinks about it, is she trusting them too soon? Or is it okay because they're not adults like Cathy and Grace? Probably the latter. The important thing is, is that people lie all the time. You never know when they're going to stab you in the back.

Kitty nods before walking over to hold hands with Jane. Everyone starts to leave, except Anne and Lina, who are technically grounded for a period of time, and Cathy, who stays to give them one last reminder.

"No one is to get off of this couch, alright?" The two girls nod, and Cathy leaves the room. 

The first few minutes is spent in angry silence. The classmates are seated on opposite side of the couch, their heads turned away from each other.

Neither of them want to apologize first. That's like giving up and saying that the other is better, or more powerful, or whatever. Regardless, they stay quiet, sneakily stealing glances to see if the other has moved yet.

"Why must you always get me into trouble?" At the sound of her voice, Anne silently cheers because she initially thinks that she won. Well, until _what_ Lina said registers in her mind. She _hadn't_ apologized. She wants to start another argument. Fine.

"What're you talking about? I didn't _do_ anything."

"Yes you did."

" _You_ pushed _me_ into the-"

"That's not what I'm talking about!" The gold girl interrupts, finally turning around to face the green girl, who had also turned around. "I'm talking about last year!" Huh? There were many things that happened last year. "The thing with Snitch?"

Oh. That thing. Everything always comes back to Snitch. He thinks the whole world revolves around him. He's a jerk, and that's the one thing they can agree on.

"Well, you drew on the whiteboard!"

"But you _made_ me do it!"

"Did not!" Cathy and Grace, who are in the other room hear their voices rising. They can't tell what they're saying, and they're not going to go closer to listen on the conversation, but they know that it's not good. They can only pray that the two would stop arguing soon, and maybe lower their voices again to lower the chance of Kitty having a panic attack.

"Yes you did! You said that I'd be a scaredy-cat if I didn't do it!" Anne laughs at this.

"You could've just not done it! You're a scaredy-cat anyway!"

"Am not! And you didn't even get in trouble! You drew on the whiteboard as well!"

"That was 'cause Snitch dared me to! If I didn't, he would've told the whole school about-" Anne cuts herself off. She went too far. No. She's not going to tell _Catalina Aragon_ about her problems. No. No. No.

"About what?" The volume of their conversation starts to lower once again (to Cathy and Grace's relief. They can't hear the girls anymore). Lina's intention with the question was to be annoyed and get her to just say it, but as the pause draws out, she can't help but feel a pinch of concern. 

Just a pinch though. It's a natural response, it doesn't mean that she's forgiven Anne yet. That'd be a sight to see.

Meanwhile, Anne's debating her options yet again. She might be seen as weak if she doesn't own up to what she started. But it's her life, her problems, and none of Lina's business. They're not sisters after all.

"....." But... "About...." Then why is she telling her? "About my dead mom, okay?" As soon as she says it, and sees the look on Lina's face, she scoffs. "Not like _you'd_ understand."

Lina blinks twice. Anne Boleyn? Having a similar story to hers? What. In. The. World? How is this possible? Anne is.....Anne. And they have something in _common_?

".....When my mom died, Snitch said I had to do as he said or he'd tell the class. But he told everyone anyway." This time, Anne is the one completely puzzled, as a similar thought process runs through _her_ mind.

"Oh." Is all she manages to respond with at first, because are she and Lina _bonding_? "Um...." Silence passes through, until the black-haired girl speaks up again. "I guess......I'm sorry...."

She goes straight to the apology, the realization of their related backstories clearly being common knowledge between them. The girl across from her acknowledges this, and the thought of her 'winning' doesn't even cross her mind.

"I guess I'm sorry too...." The brunette mumbles, just loud enough that Anne can hear it. And that's good enough for the both of them.

And maybe Anne can trust Lina. Maybe. Probably. No, just maybe.

Maybe she can trust her.

~ ~ ~

Another three days pass, and all the children (finally) are good friends and are playing what Cathy can only describe as a combination of 'Criminal Mastermind' and 'Sacrifice to the Gods' in the living room. How in the world the kids came up with that idea, the adults have no clue, but they're a bit scared of the answer that will come out if they ask.

The two foster parents ask for a word with Anne. Once she (and of course, Kitty, who still follows her around and especially since Anne's not in trouble anymore) is at the table, Cathy and Grace break the news that they had received an hour prior.

"Hey Anne?" Grace starts out with, Anne humming in response. Anne has clearly been the most hesitant out of the children when it comes to trust. Though, perhaps Kitty as well, since she hasn't exactly spoken a full sentence since arriving. "So we just got a call....and they need you and Kitty to participate in trial on Monday."

Oh. Trial. Lina said that those things were really long and boring if you're just watching. But when she had to go up as what she calls a 'witness', she said it's scary and you have to answer a lot of questions about your life--even the ones you don't like. She also said that Cathy and Grace didn't tell her that she was going to do that, so that's something as well.

"And um... _unlike_ what we did with Lina..." _Heh. That's for sure_. The seven year old thinks to herself. "We thought you might like some practice." The girl in black concludes.

"Do it." A seemingly loud whisper is heard from the entrance.

"Lina, por favor deja de escuchar. Nadie escuchó a escondidas sus conversaciones." The writer gently reminds, making Lina scurry off and disappear. Anne squints her eyes at the two, as if searching for some ulterior motive. After all, that's how it works, isn't it? The second grader leans back and agrees.

"Okay.." Her tone seems to be a bit hesitant. The only thing missing would be her doing the 'I got my eye on you' finger motion.

"Okay. Grace was able to come up with some questions and get some questions from the lawyer that you might be asked at the trial. You might not have to answer some of these questions, and this definitely isn't all the question you'll have to answer. Does it make sense?" Anne squints her eyes again before slowly nodding. What are these two up to?

Not wanting to make eye contact in anyway, Anne turns her eyes towards her younger sister, who'd brought her coloring book to the table and is trying her hardest to color inside the lines. Anne is so grateful that she hasn't gotten _hurt_ so far. They better not ruin the streak.

"Do you want to start now?" The green girl shrugs. They're going to start anyway, so why bother giving her opinion. "Okay, can I ask the first question?" Ugh. Just get on with it. Anne nods. "Okay. What is your name?"

"Anne Boleyn? Duh." She says after scoffing. What kind of dumb question was that? Everyone's gonna know her name, isn't this all about her and Kitty?

"How old are you?" 

"Seven and a half. This is dumb." She mutters the last part to herself, and thankfully they didn't hear. Or if they did hear, they say nothing. Which is still good.

"How do you know Katherine Howard?"

"She's my sister. Step-sister actually, but still." 

"How do you know Edmund Howard?"

"He's my step-dad. I thought you'd know that since you asked about Kitty." Cathy asks Grace to pause to give Anne a little reminder.

"Anne, you can't make comments like that in the real thing, okay?" Anne rolls her eyes, but nods. The blue girl purses her lips before leaning back in her chair and going back to being silent. She nods her head at her best friend, cueing her to start again.

"Who is George Boleyn?" At that name, Anne flinches. This doesn't go unnoticed by the others at the table. She curls up her fist into a tight ball and bites the inside of her lip. She focuses her attention on bouncing her leg up and down, fighting back tears and trying not break.

How? How did they find out about him? Did they do research on her? Do they know _everything_ that happened that night? Who told them? Why are they asking her this? Why now? 

....Oh. Well actually....

"This was your plan huh?" Anne doesn't look at their faces, not wanting to see the sorrowful expression that are probably going to be on them. "You just want me to tell you what happened, so that you know my weakness, so that you can hurt us huh!? Well it's NOT GOING TO WORK!"

Anne grabs Kitty's hand and drags the both of them upstairs to their room, making sure to slam the door. The noise causes the pink girl to let out a little yelp.

"A-Annie?" The older sister quickly changes her demeanor from loud anger to soft worry at the sight of the younger. She starts to follow her procedure for calming Kitty down in these types of things.

Kneel in front of her to let her know you're not going to hurt her. Softly whisper so she can recognize that it's you. When her breathing starts to slow down, even just a little, open your arms to invite her for a hug-- _never_ move closer to her, it seems to panic her more.

And after a minute or two, Kitty crawls into Anne's lap, melting into her touch. She whispers an apology into her ear while rubbing her back soothingly, getting a nod in return. Anne is the only one she allows to do that, not Jane, not even George, just Anne.

The adults downstairs don't follow the two girls, not wanting to scare them, and wanting to give them some time to calm down. And give them space. That's one of the biggest things they've been giving them.

But eventually, they _do_ have to go upstairs and check on them. They give them what feels like half an hour due to their worry, but really it's only five minutes.

Cathy hesitates to knock on their door, afraid of the response, so Grace ends up doing it. There's no response. The two share a look before Grace knocks again, earning them a rather bitter response.

"What do you want?!" Noticing Cathy's flinch and hesitation, Grace responds.

"Sweetie, we just want to apologize. We didn't mean to make you upset.." The girl in black waits to see if the seven year will respond. "We didn't know it was a trigger, and it's fine if you don't want to talk." More silence. "But remember that you'll still have to answer it when we go on Monday."

"Then why do I have to answer it now?"

"You don't." Cathy simply puts, finally comfortable with talking to the girl again. "But we just don't want you to panic when it comes down to it. We were hoping to prepare you because we didn't do it for Lina, but if you're uncomfortable, we can stop." Anne notices how they don't ask to come inside.

With her step-dad, he always came in without asking. It scared her sometimes. With her mum, she always knocked and asked, but if she didn't answer, she'd come in anyway. Still better than her step-dad anyway.

They're not forcing her into doing anything, into being perfect like Jane's parents, and her parents. They're not trying to make her feel guilty or sorry. They explain themselves in a different way. She doesn't know what, but it's somewhat comforting.

No. She can't give in to trusting them yet. This is exactly how they got hurt. Because she trusted him. Because she thought he was trustworthy. Because she thought he wouldn't do anything bad. She shouldn't trust them yet. But she does pity them because she sees how worried they get when she closes herself off or ignores them.

Maybe... Maybe just this once.

"You can come in." Cathy and Grace gently open the door, hiding the shock that was on their faces a few seconds earlier. Anne squeezes Kitty gently, reassuring her as the adults walk in and sit on the bit of floor in front of them. "I don't want to answer the questions.....but I'm gonna tell you what happened." Very quickly Anne adds on, "And you better not have any plans."

The two foster parents nod, keeping in mind Anne's still apparent distrust. They know it's all part of the process, but the amount of time it's taking is a lot longer than the others. Hopefully Vicki and Courtney's advice (and constant reminder, it might as well be their motto) to be patient will benefit them.

"We don't. Don't worry."

Half of Anne wants to believe them. That they don't have any ulterior motives. That it's going to work out. But the other half, and quite frankly, the louder one, thinks they're lying.

But regardless, Anne starts talking.

"...Alright. At first it was Mary, George, Mum and me. Mum started working a lot, and then she married Kitty's dad. I didn't like him at first, but mum said that she loved him so I let it slide. We were fine then. But..when mum died...." Anne pauses a bit, as she remembers where it all went downhill. "Step-dad got more strict and angry than before. And then one day all of us except Mary got home and he asked us if we wanted to play a game, so me, George, and Kitty said yes."

Cathy and Grace prepare themselves for the worst, getting a bad feeling about what Anne will say next.

"He said 'whoever I catch first will be the special guest in my room tonight'. We all started running 'cause we thought it was just tag, and he caught Kitty first, and George and I ran to my room so he wouldn't catch us. We heard his door close, and then George and I heard Kitty scream and step-dad yell. George ran out to go see what was wrong, but I was too scared, then there was a gunshot so then I ran out and George was bleeding. Mary came up and tried to take the gun away, but he shot her too then the police came into the house and step-dad ran out the back door."

The girl in black and the girl in blue do their best to keep a neutral expression, but a small percentage of empathy shows. And no not sympathy. Because although they'll never experience something like that (God forbid), they're able to catch the fear.

Anne had told the story in fear, and while trying to hide her tears in Kitty's hair, their hug never releasing. It does explain why she's extremely cautious around them, and why she's so protective of Kitty.

Speaking of which, the four year old, looks up to her role model with worried eyes.

"Don't cwy Annie. I love you." That's about the most full sentence Cathy and Grace have heard from their youngest since they've met her. Anne smiles, wiping away her tears before planting a kiss on her sister's temple and hugging her again.

"Thank you, Anne." Grace follows up. "I know you don't trust us completely yet, so thank you for telling us your story." Anne nods.

Maybe she.......nah.

Not yet. 

Just a bit more.

~ ~ ~

The day of the trial comes, the girls are excused from school for the entire day since the trial is scheduled for 10 in the morning. And as much as she hates to admit it, Lina's right about it being long and boring. The only thing keeping her awake is the other foster kids of the house.

When Anne goes up, it's a bit easier than Lina told her it would be, but that's probably because of what happened two days ago.

But when they ask Kitty, to go up--by _herself_ \--Anne squeezes Kitty's hand. She is _not_ going up there.

"No, she can't go." When the big person in the big chair tries to convince her, Anne shakes her head harder. "No, she doesn't like to be by herself. She doesn't like talking now either."

"Perhaps I can help." The sound of an unfortunately familiar voice causes the green and pink girls to flinch. Kitty's dad, after getting a nod from the big chair person, gets up from his seat on the other side of the room. He walks over to the two girls acting all casual like.

"NO!" Kitty screams when her father tries to reach out to her. No more. No more playtime. Her dad turns his head to give a small chuckle at the big person and tries to grab her again. "NO! NO! NO!"

Anne becomes more angry as he tries to grab her sister. With Anne being the buffer between them, her step-dad has to reach over her to try and take Kitty. So his arm brushes along Anne when he touches Kitty's leg.

The older of the sisters doesn't even know how it happened, but she slams into the only father figure she's known hard enough that he stumbles back.

"Stop! Go away!" And as soon as she does it, she turns back, and immediately starts calming down Kitty, who's clearly having a panic attack.

"Y-Your Honor?" This time, the voice comes from...Cathy? Who slowly stands up and starts to speak. "I don't mean to intrude, but, if that's not enough indication that he's hurt and traumatized these girls, then I don't know what is."

"And you, Miss Parr. You along with Miss Mouat haven't done anything similar to the events that Miss Anne Boleyn has recalled to all of us?" Cathy shakes her head, and is about to verbally decline herself, before a German accent beats her to it.

"They never do that before!" Anna is quickly shushed by the other children, which causes the big person to laugh. He takes a look at the five girls, who are all sitting next to each other, and to him clearly love and care about each other _and_ their foster parents. He takes a breath before addressing the entire room.

"Very well. I'm sure the jury will agree with me when I say that Edmund Howard is guilty of the crimes stated. Anne Boleyn and Katherine Howard will remain in the custody of foster parents Catherine Parr and Grace Mouat-"

Whatever he says next, the children don't pay attention to, because the group of five is too happy celebrating to care. They're staying. Their dad will be long gone. And that's great.

The next day, everyone wakes up early enough that they're all able to sit at the table and eat breakfast _without_ rushing to school. As Anne consumes her breakfast, she looks around the table at each person.

Anna (Nana to Kitty). Sort-of-sister number 1. Jane (Janey). Before-cousin-now-sort-of-sister or in other words, sort-of-sister 2. Lina (Catti, which Kitty made from her full name Catalina (how, Anne will never know)). Before-I-hated-you-but-now-we're-fine-and-we're-friends-and-kinda-related-now or for short, sort-of-sister 3.

Grace (Gracey). Foster parent 1, and really the one who made her open up before the trial. Cathy (CathCath). Foster parent 2, and the one who stood up for them during the trial and convinced the big person to let them stay.

And she could never forget Kitty. Kat. Kitkat. Kit. A bunch of other nicknames that only she uses. Her baby _real_ sister. Well, they're still step-sisters, but no one cares anymore. Kitty. Her four year old sister who will _finally_ be safe. Safe from step-dad. 

And that's on trusting that this new family will keep her safe no matter what.

Because as much as she'll miss her mum and Mary and George...

She trusts that this new family will be the best one yet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm sure you can tell how excited i was for this chapter by how long it is 😝😜
> 
> but if anyone's confused on anne's backstory i can try to explain it better in the comments below. especially the bits with jane and lina, i thought it'd make more sense to just have it as common knowledge between the kids and not explain it.  
> but yea anyway don't be scared to ask, friends!


	8. Happy Birthday Anna and Jane!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's Anna and Jane's birthdays!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so much angst last chapter....hehe.  
> I'M REALLY SORRY I DIDN'T ACTUALLY WRITE ANYTHING FOR THIS
> 
> (the pov is kinda weird at times?? idk)

Anna wakes up at 5 in the morning just because she can. And because she _knows_ that she's the first one awake, she jumps out of bed and runs to wake up everyone else.

She wakes up Jane first, because she's least likely to be mad at her for waking up this early. Lina is next, because Jane is able to convince Lina to not chase Anna. Anne and Kitty are after, the three knocking on the door and gently waking them up, since they're still getting over that trigger.

The parents are last, because Anna wouldn't want to scare them awake without her sisters. Cathy first, since she's _easier_ to wake up, and also because she too likes waking up Grace with the kids.

"Remember to run. One, two, three!" Grace jolts awake, and like Cathy's plan, everyone rushes out, including a very tired and annoyed Grace. The little chase somehow turns into a pillow fight in the living room. It only ends when Anna and Anne run into the kitchen, grab some _oranges_ and start throwing them at Grace (for once).

The red girl's birthday lands on a Thursday, Cathy and Grace making a little joke about spoiling them, since they've taken them out of school again _just_ to celebrate.

They eat breakfast in the house, and leave for the theme park after getting dressed. Quite honestly, it's a good thing that Anna woke up at five so the kids can take a quick nap before they arrive.

As expected, chaos ensues, Anna asking to ride on absolutely anything that she's tall enough for, the other children excitingly riding with her (except Kitty most of the time, who pouted whenever she was too short, and waited patiently until Anne came back. She still has fun though).

When one or more of the older kids find a ride they want to ride that Anna's too small for, the German girl revisits one of the rides with Kitty, while the others go.

Cathy and Grace get dragged into their foster kids' excitement a lot. Grace ends up riding more than Cathy because the latter is a 'scaredy-cat' according to the former (that made the children laugh).

Lots of other things happen, _yay_ you get the point, I'm too lazy to write it all out. I'm pretty sure they go to other places, but I honestly have no idea where. But as you do, the kids fall asleep on the ride home....and Cathy, but Grace doesn't mind--that girl needs the sleep.

~ ~ ~

Friday, the school actually _had_ a no school day scheduled, so that's good news for Cathy and Grace (at least for the number of days they've excused the girls from school).

It's also the day in between Anna and Jane's birthday, so their party is scheduled for today.

Obviously, Casa de la Chaos is invited. The only thing that required some thinking was the fact that the birthday girls wanted to invite their friends from school. Which of course, made Anne and Lina want to invite _their_ friends, and quite honestly, it'd be a _lot_ of little girls too handle (all girls, as in _everyone's_ a girl, wow).

(Of course, the above had been discussed prior to this week)

So, two phases, as Cathy calls it. From 10 to 4, they'll celebrate in one of the parks with friends from school, Anne and Lina only being allowed to invite one other friend, and 'no it can't be Collette, she's coming later. Sorry'.

Then 5 and later is at the house with Casa de la Chaos, which in other words is Collette and fam. When they walk in, Anna counts them (all in good manner, don't worry kids) and states with a bit of surprise,

"There's five of you now." Collette proudly nods and steps to the side to allow the others to see her new sister a bit better. Said new girl twists her ankle shyly before getting a pat on her shoulder by Vicki.

"Hi. I'm Cherelle. You can call me CJ."

So yeah, um that happened. The rest? Party stuff. I don't even know. There's not really much to say. Casa de la Chaos leaves at 11, but not before this exchange:

"Sleep is a thing, Cathy. You should try it."

"Never, I don't need sleep."

"Set a good example for your foster children, Cathy."

"They already know."

"That is _no_ excuse, now go upstairs and sleep, you deprived human."

"You haven't even left yet."

Um and yeah, that's fun.

~ ~ ~

On Saturday, it's Jane's official birthday, but _unlike_ Anna, she lets everyone sleep. Not for much longer though, since she gets bored being awake by herself by around 6:15 (having woken up at 6. She's excited for her birthday too, okay?)

So she goes around, waking everyone up in this order: Anne/Kitty (they're her cousins), Lina (besides Anne and Kitty, she knew her before coming here and therefore is closer to her), Anna (got to wake up the children first), Grace (because although a cranky Grace is at risk, she wants to let Cathy sleep).

Actually, Jane requests that they make breakfast _before_ waking Cathy up so she can sleep. Grace obviously finds this adorable, and agrees, keeping the fact that Cathy will come down as Grace is cooking to herself.

Ok so today they go to the zoo, Jane having never been, but absolutely adores animals, so she took the opportunity since she could pick. (Of course, that mindset had to be convinced, since Jane had _insisted_ that she was fine with Cathy and Grace picking. As you can tell, the adults won that negotiation).

Everyone enjoys seeing the animals, but as always, there's one animal each that makes them uneasy.

Cathy doesn't like the bugs (butterflies she can _handle_ but not exactly). Grace and Lina don't like the reptile section. Anne flinches in the bird section (though she denies that ever happening or her fear of birds). Kitty freaks out a bit at the monkeys (though not to the point of a panic attack, don't worry). 

Anna and Jane really like all of them (though, one of the gorillas scares them on purpose, but the girls know it's just playing, so they laugh it off).

The highlight of the trip though is when they're at the elephant exhibit (one of the first ones they go to), Jane is watching one of the baby elephants. It walks up to her, sticking it's trunk up in the air as if it's waving.

"Hi there." Jane, being a bit farther away from the group (but still close, I want to make that clear), starts to have a conversation with the baby. The cool thing is, is that it seems like the little elephant is responding. 

It walks slightly, as if showing the blonde something. Jane squints her eyes, focusing carefully, and sees that the baby's limping, not putting any weight on one of its legs. It's the back one, so might be why no one has noticed it.

"Does your leg hurt? The back one?" The elephant toots, as if to say yes. Long story short, Jane and Cathy end up telling one of the zookeepers. When they check it out, Jane refuses to leave until she sees the baby get treated, or until they tell her it's nothing major.

But of course, she's right, and her sisters stare at her in awe, since she noticed it, and no one else did. They tell her she's an 'animal whisperer' and although the now seven year old denies it, it's still kind of true.

_ Happy birthday Anna! Happy birthday Jane! _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i actually tried to write something but i was just not feeling it and i kinda just wanted to move on to the next chapter which i actually want to write 😬😅
> 
> I'M SO SORRY THIS WASN'T AN ACTUAL UPDATE PLS FORGIVE ME


	9. Kitty

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Meet, Kitty!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you remember how vague i was with kitty during anne's chapter?  
> yeah....this is why
> 
> tw: molestation, gun violence, murder/death, mentions of blood, panic attack (idk if claustrophobia is a trigger, but anna has a panic attack based on that (it's really minor tho))
> 
> SORRY THIS IS REALLY OVERDUE

They made her leave. Annie wanted so bad to stay with her. Annie is all she has left. Don't leave. _Please_. Don't leave her alone again!

But then she _is_ alone.

Just like that night...

(・_・ ) (・_・ ) (・_・ )

Kitty is curled up in her older sister's lap, watching kids and adults come and go. Her hand is gripped tightly to Annie's shirt, making sure she doesn't leave. Though, with the way the four year old can feel the pressure of Anne's arms, she doesn't think she'll be leaving anytime soon.

But then from the corner of her eye, she sees someone familiar. She doesn't see her full face, mostly the side. But something about this blonde girl who just walked in strikes her as someone she knows.

So being the four year old she is, she jumps down from Anne's lap and starts weaving through the crowd. Not that there were _that_ many people, but it makes it easier for Kitty if she thinks about it in that way. 

She hears her older sister's voice from behind her, thankful that's she's still following her, but the minor thought is pushed aside as the cat finally reaches its target.

And her suspicion proves to be true.

"Janey!" Kitty loves Janey dearly, remembering all the times she'd spent time with her during visits. She runs up to her older cousin and greets her with a big hug like she always does. But the embrace isn't reciprocated right away, worrying the younger.

Why isn't she hugging her back? Is Jane mad at her? Did she do something wrong?

"K-Kitty? Anne?" Oh. She just hadn't expected them to be there. That's good. Kitty didn't make her mad. She doesn't want that.......... _that_........again.

"Hello Jane. Fancy seeing you here." Annie greets Janey, and Kitty releases the latter from their hug, and goes back to hold Anne's hand again. 

As soon as she does, the girl with pretty hair and glasses and starts talking to them. Kitty doesn't really listen, mostly holding Annie's hand tightly and sticking close to her. She doesn't _really_ know the pretty girl, what if she's mean and wants to do things with her?

Kitty can't help but glance at her from time to time. When she's not doing that, she looks at the other children. Janey looks confused, the oldest one looks scary and mad, and the other one....notices her staring and smiles sweetly.

When she does, Kitty immediately averts her eyes, hiding behind Annie for a second. Once Kitty peeks out, she sees that the girl's smile is still there. She seems nice.

"Hi, I'm Anna. I'm five." Kitty is still only peeking out from behind her sister when the girl, now known as Anna, steps in front and waves to both of them. "That's Lina, she's seven. And this is Jane, she's six." Anna points to the scary one and her cousin respectively.

"Cool. I'm Anne. This is my sister Katherine. She goes by Kitty." Anna smiles and waves to Kitty once again, now being formally introduced. Though, Kitty doesn't want to answer, afraid of the consequences. Afraid because of what happened.

"Don't tell me _she's_ coming home with us." When the scary girl, Lina, talks, she's loud and mean-sounding. Like her daddy. Like her daddy when he gets mad. Like on that night. 

No! She doesn't like it! She doesn't want to! Why is daddy acting like this? Why isn't daddy listening? Why is daddy doing this? To her? Did she do something?

Kitty's eyes widen and her breath quickens, though she tries her best not to grab too much attention. No one likes that.

"It's okay Chaton." Annie's voice is reassuring, and Kitty now knows that nothing is actually happening to her right now. She raises her arms, silently asking to be held, and without hesitation her older sister of three years picks her up.

There's a bit more talking, but Kitty doesn't listen at all, as she's trying to ground herself in Annie's touch, to calm herself. It doesn't happen right away, but she's glad that Annie doesn't put her down. She knows she's heavy for her.

Nuzzling her face into her sister's neck, the four year old is carried all the way to the car, where her breathing finally evens. However, she doesn't want to move from her position, completely content with looking out the window throughout the car drive.

When the car stops is when Kitty is okay with walking again, as long as her hand doesn't leave Annie's, that is. She follow her, who's following a girl with kinda long black hair, and is also wearing some black, along with white.

Kitty likes to pay attention to the color of things. She likes silently naming the colors in her head when she looks at different things. It's a bit of fun for her. Like, as they walk into the new room, the first thing Kitty notices is that the walls are a pretty color of green.

Green is Annie's favorite color. She has some things that were green in her room, but not a lot, since daddy doesn't like her liking green. She doesn't know why though.

"Green." Kitty tells her sister, tugging on her arm.

"Yeah. I like green."

"Pink?" As much as Kitty thinks green is a pretty color, her absolute favorite is pink. Unlike Annie, Kitty's able to have lots of her favorite color in her room.

"We can get some pink in here if you want. We should probably get an extra bed in here as well..." Kitty flinches for a second at the unfamiliar voice before she realizes that it's the same girl that Annie followed. And the thought of having both her favorite color _and_ her role model's favorite color excites the youngest.

Though, she knows she shouldn't accept something without asking, so she turns towards Annie, putting on her best puppy eyes that she doesn't use unless she really wants something. It only works on her siblings though. Her step-mum always smiled when she does it but it never works, and her daddy always ignores it.

"That sounds good....no conditions though." Kitty smiles brightly at the approval, giving Annie a big hug. Yay! It worked like a charm.

But later, when Kitty expects that they're going home, they don't. Instead, Annie leads the two of them to the green room that they looked at earlier. Tilting her head, Kitty asks a question.

"Home?" Annie shakes her head as she goes to the dresser and takes out some pajamas that aren't theirs. "Not ours." Kitty doesn't understand why Annie is getting ready for bed in this new house and they're not going home to their _real_ house.

"I know, but they said we need to stay here. It's like a sleepover." Neither sister has _actually_ been on a sleepover, but from the way Mary makes it sound, it's supposed to be fun. But, they're not really having fun if they don't know anyone.

"Go tomorrow?" Kitty notices Annie pursing her lips before shaking her head. "Why?"

"Because it's just us. You know this. We need to stay with Cathy and Grace now." Kitty wishes she and Anne could have Mary and George and step-mum and _nice_ daddy back, but it won't happen. Annie says so.

And if Annie says that they have to stay here, then she supposes that this is their new home now. It doesn't feel like it. But it's their home now.

~ ~ ~

Today is a Monday. Kitty is _pretty_ sure on that, but she still gets her days of the week mixed up sometimes. She had to go to daycare, which is really pre-school because she's four, and she didn't really like it.

She doesn't like that Annie has to go to school and that she can't come with her. She doesn't like that she has to spend the day without knowing that her big sister is going to be there to protect her.

But it's fine now because she's in their home-not-home and Annie is here to protect her. 

"Kitty, come on." The older of the sister beckons the younger to follow her, knowing she'll come without question (of course, this only applies to Annie). Annie leads them to one of other girl's rooms.

"Hi Anne! Hi Kitty!" Kitty recognizes her as Anna. She's the one who smiled nicely at her when they first met everyone. She seems nice.

"Can I ask you something, Anna?" Annie asks the other girl as she sits down in front of her. Kitty is quick to copy her role model's actions, sitting criss-cross-applesauce right next to her.

The four year old spaces out for a bit, looking around at the colors. Anna seems to like the color red. There's a red design on the walls, plus her bed sheets and clothes have a lot of red on them too.

The toys she'd been playing with look like robots, that have a couple of different colors, red, blue, yellow, gray, black, a lot. Annie's green shirt and Kitty's pink shirt seem to stick out in Anna's room.

"Ok. Well, you know Kitty's my sister." When Kitty hears her name, she takes Annie's hand and squeezes it, curling into her side as she now tunes in to the conversation. "She means a lot to me, and I don't want her to get hurt. I mean, she's only four. You understand, right?"

"Yeah. And I don't want Kitty getting hurt either. She's like my younger sister now." Wait. But she's Annie's sister. Is that possible? To be sisters if you only live together? Well, it sounds right.

"Well, I was wondering if you could keep an eye on Catalina and Jane for me."

"Why?"

"Because they hate me. Or, some stuff happened before that made us not like each other anymore. I don't want them to hurt Kitty because they don't like me." Kitty remembers Annie talking about how she doesn't like Catalina, and now that she's met her, Kitty sees why. She's scary. 

But....Janey? Their cousin? Why would Annie think that Janey might hurt her? Or...why do they not like each other? What happened? Is it because of her?

"Okay. I can do that."

A few days later, Annie, Kitty, and Anna are in the kitchen grabbing some snacks before they go to the living room. As her older sister helps reach the crackers, Kitty watches Anna grab a banana.

She giggles quietly to herself. The words kind of sound the same. Anna. Banana. Banana Anna. That's when she decides on a nickname for the girl, as she loves to use them.

"Nana." The red girl doesn't respond at first, so the pink girl tries again. "Nana." This time, the five year old turns her head towards the younger. "Some?" Kitty asks, pointing to the yellow fruit. Anna smiles.

"Yeah, of course." The girl breaks the banana in half, giving the part without the peel to the four year old. Though Kitty doesn't say anything after, her little smile is enough of thanks for Nana.

Nibbling on her snack, Kitty follows the two older girls back into the living room to play video games. For her, that means _watching_ them play because she's 'too little'. Sometimes she wishes she was older so she could do more things.

But yes, maybe staying here as their new home won't be so bad.

~ ~ ~

"Anne! Can you come down, please?" Kitty and Annie had been playing in their room when the voice is heard, calling for them from downstairs. The older sister lets out a sigh before turning to her younger sister and tilting her head in the direction of the door.

The four year old stretches as she gets up and follows Annie as she always does. As they reach the room with the voices, Kitty recognizes the people there as Janey, Cathy, and Grace (nicknames not established yet for the other two).

"Yeah?" Kitty looks toward her role model, watching as she crosses her arms. The youngest moves her arms in a similar motion, trying to figure out how to do it.

But before she can fully make sense of it, Annie is walking toward the table. Snapping out of her thought process, Kitty makes like a duckling following its mother. When the green girl takes a seat, she pulls the pink girl into her lap, just as she always does.

Kitty admittedly doesn't listen to what Grace is saying, simply spacing out as she waits for them to leave. And it's when they do, that Kitty's comfortable with tugging on Annie's shoulder and well....talking.

"Go Janey?" She really hopes she'll say yes. It's been a while since Kitty's cuddled with Janey, and she's not oblivious so Annie's more recent attitude towards the girl.

"Sure." Once again, Kitty gives a silent thanks by giving her sister about the cutest smile you will ever see. There's a little hop in her step as she makes her way to Janey, holding her arms out. "It's fine, Jane." Is what she hears her sister say before her cousin picks her up.

Immediately, Kitty melts into her touch, having missed her cousin's cuddles (though, nothing will ever beat Annie's cuddles).

And that's really all she focuses on. She absentmindedly plays with the hem of Janey's shirt, sometimes snuggling in further, and not listening to what Janey and Annie are talking about at all. Until...

"Yes! That's the point!" Kitty flinches at the sudden increase in volume. It's nothing too major, just a little shock, is all. Thankfully for her, Annie seems to lower her voice again.

Kitty spaces out again, not really knowing why until she glances at the clock. Oh. It's almost her naptime. No wonder--she's just tired, is all.

Her eyelids quickly turn heavy, Kitty succumbing to sleep in Janey's arms.

She has no idea what happened after that, but when she wakes up, she's on the couch. Annie is sitting right next to her, Nana on the floor, and beside her sister...is Janey. Whatever happened during her nap seems to have made Annie not not-like Janey.

And she isn't complaining in the slightest.

~ ~ ~

Kitty flinches at the crash. She remembers the last time Annie broke something in their house, and how loud daddy got. She can feel her breath quickening slightly, but before a panic attack arises, Annie is by her side, squeezing her hand gently.

She, as always, sticks close to Annie's side as the adults of the house walk in to see all the commotion.

"Anne made me do it." Kitty notices as Lina, the one she seems to keep referring to as the scary one, accuses her sister without hesitation. The way Kitty saw it, the two bumped into each other, and they both knocked it over.

"No I didn't! Lina pushed me into it." But she doesn't want to say anything. She doesn't talk much around the other kids, even Annie now, so why would she in front of the _adults_? She's only ever known her daddy as the adults in her life, and.....she shouldn't go down that road.

But she doesn't like how Annie and Lina are arguing. She doesn't like seeing them loud and angry. It reminds her of him. Of daddy.... Daddy......stop...

"That's enough." The noticeably female voice (thankfully) brings Kitty out of her thoughts. She follows everyone's gaze towards the girl in black. "Cathy?" And then towards the girl in blue.

"I think there's been enough bickering, yeah?" Kitty finds herself nodding slightly, but only slightly. "Okay. Now since we don't know who did it, the both of you are going to sit on this couch until you apologize. Everyone else needs to leave these two alone."

Kitty knows that Cathy means Annie and Lina, but she can't help but be slightly afraid of this consequence. Because everything just seems to tie back in to her daddy. Not to mention if she's away from Annie, she has no idea what's gonna happen.

She doesn't know if one of them is going to get hurt, or if she's gonna have a panic attack, or if someone's gonna take her away for good. She wouldn't like that. She's scared of that.

"No. I need to stay with Kitty. She can't be in another room without me." And Kitty notices that Annie feels the same way. That bit is a little bit of comfort for her, but it doesn't fully overpower the four year olds 'what ifs'.

"Kitty darling, Anne's going to be a bit busy for a while, okay? Do you think you could stay with Jane and Anna for a bit?" She's not going to be 'busy' like Grace tells Kitty. She's not _that_ little, she knows when someone's getting punished. Hopefully it's not too big of a punishment.

But Kitty loves Janey and has grown quite fond of Nana, so she'll feel safe around them. But leaving Annie....with the scary girl, no less.... She doesn't want to speak up and tell Grace what she thinks, because then _she_ might get a punishment.

So the safe thing to do is ask Annie. When in doubt, ask Annie. The pink girl squeezes the green girl's hand, who, after a moment of thought, gives her a yes in the form of a nod. 

With that, Kitty walks over to Janey and takes her hand, because she feels more safe that way. Instead of Annie, she follows Nana and Janey out of the living room. Kitty turns her head slightly to look at Annie one last time before fully turning around and walking out.

The three of them head upstairs and into Janey's room. It's a pretty purple, Kitty notes, but pink will always be her favorite color. 

"Can we play with your stuffies until they're done?" Nana asks, gesturing to a basket filled with a bunch of different stuffies. Brown, yellow, green, purple, one Kitty recognizes as Jane's favorite, Fluffy the blue bunny, and that's not the end of it.

"Sure." Janey tips the basket over, dumping the stuffies onto the floor. The silver and red girls sit down and start looking through the pile for a stuffie to play as. Kitty, taking a seat next to Janey, doesn't reach out, but is looking as well. Her eyes scan the collection for one she might want to play with, not paying attention to what Janey and Nana are talking about.

She should probably start listening, but before she does, she catches sight of her favorite color. Not wanting to actually reach in (and risk unwanted contact), she tugs on Janey's sleeve, before pointing to the stuffie.

"Hm? Oh, you want that one, Kitty?" The youngest girl nods, and Janey willingly reaches out and grabs it for her. It's a fluffy pink kitten with a matching bow tied around its neck. 

"How're you girls doing?" Kitty holds the kitten stuffie tight, giving it a squeeze when she hears Cathy's voice.

"Good." The children chorus, well, except Kitty of course. Being around the adults in the house still makes her nervous.

"Oh? What's all this?" And if just Cathy makes her nervous, what more when Grace pops into the room? Kitty braces herself for the yelling that always came when her daddy walked in on a mess like this. Why should these two be any different?

"We're playing with Jane's stuffies. Can you play with us?" Play? With them? Nana wants playtime? N-no. That couldn't be happening, it can't be happening again. The adults give each other a look, and peek out to where Annie and Lina are sitting, before answering Nana's question.

"Alright. Just for a little bit." Kitty scoots closer to Janey, now extremely wary of the two joining. Fortunately for her, Cathy and Grace sit a good distance away from the four year old. Why, Kitty has no idea. But since it's a good thing, she'd rather not question it.

Of course, she can't help but wonder. How are these kids okay with _playtime_? Playtime is _bad_. They hurt her. No wait. Not them. Him. Daddy. Daddy no... No I don't wanna....

"Kitty? You ok?" Janey whispers in her ear. Nothing's happened. No one has a gun. No one's on the floor. There's no blood. No one's hurt. Cathy and Grace still have all of their clothes on. It's fine. She thinks.

Kitty gives Janey a small nod, not letting go of the kitten stuffie. The blonde gives Kitty a small smile and the two of them continue playing, the others not noticing their little interaction.

And a few minutes later, Kitty realizes that this playtime is....different. She's actually having fun, and Kitty (and the pink kitten) enjoys it. That's....good. This is good.

However that's when, somehow, Janey trips and shuts the closet door in on Nana. The pink girl remembers Cathy and Grace left the room a minute before this exchange to check in on Lina and Annie. Nana had gone in trying to reach something for their game, but couldn't, so Janey got up to help her. Then she tripped on something and now Nana's stuck in the closet. It takes a few seconds for it to fully register, but when it does....

"CATHY! GRACE!!" Either Lina and Annie are still mad at each other, or they made up but Cathy and Grace left them, because the two adults adults practically run into the room. Janey scoots back and points to the closet, a bit scared herself, but also so she can try and comfort Kitty, who had flinched at the red girl's voice.

Grace is the one who swings open the closet door, Nana launching herself out towards the two of them.

"Shh....Hey, it's alright now. You're not trapped anymore." Kitty watches as Cathy whispers to calm Nana down. She also watches as Grace reaches out to Nana, but pulls back when she sees the latter flinch. The sight is different than what she's used to.

Before _it_ happened, daddy _would_ comfort her. But he'd always pull her into hugs when she flinched, and told her to stop crying when she couldn't control it. Cathy and Grace....aren't.

Maybe.....no.....she should still ask Annie first.

But...surely giving them nicknames wouldn't hurt?

~ ~ ~

The next day, as they're watching TV, Kitty notices that Annie is sitting next to Lina. The scary girl. The one she always sat far from and glanced and glared at her. Annie always seemed to be angry at her. 

But now they're sitting next to each other? What is happening? Perhaps it's because they got in trouble and were forced to sit next to each other. But, they got un-grounded, so that can't be the reason.

When Annie leaves for a minute to get up to the bathroom, Kitty knows she has to stay in her spot (it'd be weird to follow, after all). The four year old can't help but stare at the older girl next to her. Unfortunately for her, she notices.

"Kitty?" Kitty quickly turns her head away. She's scared to be confronted by this scary girl without Annie. What if she says something wrong? "I-It's okay...Anne and I aren't mad anymore..."

Rather than asking why, Kitty tilts her head to convey the same message. Which Lina receives.

"We just talked when we got grounded. We're okay now." Lina assures. And smiles. Kitty realizes that she's never actually seen the gold girl smile before. But now that she is, Lina actually doesn't seem that scary anymore. Huh, smiles really do fix everything.

"Catti." Kitty remembers Nana telling her to ask the seven year old if a nickname is okay before using it. When said girl doesn't respond, Kitty asks again. "You Catti?"

"Ohh. Um...sure. You can call me that." Catti knows it'll be a bit strange for her, but she supposes that Kitty will probably be the only one calling her that, so it's fine. Plus, she's gotten used to being called Lina, so this shouldn't be that different.

"Tank you." Kitty says with a smile. Since Annie is now friends with Catti, she can be friends with her too.

(But don't tell her that she's still a _tiny_ bit scared of her)

~ ~ ~

"You can keep the kitten you know." Janey tells Kitty, who had silently asked for the pink kitten stuffie....again. The younger looks up with wide eyes, in disbelief. "You can have it."

Kitty smiles wide, giving Janey a hug of thanks and running off with the kitten, presumably to show Annie. Janey makes her way to the living room, where the other kids were waiting.

And the kids are able to continue their new game--the one the kids can tell scares CathCath and Gracey just a tiny bit. Unfortunately, just a few minutes in, the latter asks for Annie. And of course, if Annie's going, Kitty's going to come as well.

Kitty grabs her coloring book and crayons off of the coffee table and scurries on, following her older sister. She takes a seat at the table to Annie's left, and just colors. 

Again, she tunes out of the conversation, wanting to focus her attention on the page she's working on. She's been trying so hard to complete a picture without going outside the lines, and this time, she's going to do it. She knows it.

Okay. Green like Annie for the grass and plants... Yellow like Catti for the sun... Red like Nana for the flowers... Gray like Janey for the clouds and fence... Blue like CathCath for the sky and water... Black like Gracey's clothes for the puppy... And pink like Kitty for the kitty...

She knows cats aren't _really_ pink, but she colors it like that anyway just 'cause she can.

"How do you know Katherine Howard?" When she hears her name, that's when Kitty listens. Why would they be talking about her? This is one of those things where she knows that Annie doesn't like.

"She's my sister. Step-sister actually, but still." 

"How do you know Edmund Howard?"

"He's my step-dad. I thought you'd know that since you asked about Kitty." Annie's step-dad would mean.....Kitty's daddy... Why are they talking about daddy? Daddy....daddy hurt her....

"Who is George Boleyn?" Is the next thing Kitty hears.. Georgey was nice. Although sometimes he and Annie would leave her out, Kitty still loved him. Being left out should've been obvious though, they're twins after all. At least she's able to play with Mary when that happens (Mary hated nicknames so she's the only one who doesn't have one).

Or...was.

Daddy hurt her... And then he hurt Georgey... And then Mary... And there was blood... A lot of blood... Daddy...daddy did that...

"Well it's NOT GOING TO WORK!" Someone grabs her hand and pulls her up the stairs. The door is slammed shut, and Kitty can't do anything but curl in on herself. From Kitty's point of view, she sees a tall man with an evil grin on his face.

Walking closer to her, he starts to reach out, so she swats his hand away. She doesn't want it. She doesn't want him to touch her. She wants him to stop. But he's not listening.

And then she hears the two gunshots. The same as that night. She isn't safe here. The only safe place would be...

"A-Annie?" Kitty can't see her older sister through her tears, but she can hear the soft whispering. The four year old tries to ground herself in Annie's voice, and although it takes her a while, she's eventually able to slow her breathing down. And once she does, Annie's right there waiting.

Kitty launches herself at Annie, clinging to her shirt to make sure she doesn't leave. She feels safe in her arms. No one's going to hurt her now because Annie's here. Annie won't let it happen.

Admittedly, Kitty falls asleep in her arms, having exhausted herself from the panic attack (she won't know, but that was a good thing on her part). She only wakes up when she feels Annie stirring, crying into her hair.

"Don't cwy Annie. I love you." She feels Annie press a kiss onto her head, and Kitty hopes that just that will make her feel better.

~ ~ ~

Even though the trial is over, Kitty and Annie are officially part of their foster family (that's what she's been told it's called), and they've had some fun moments together, Kitty's still wary about the foster parents.

She loves CathCath and Gracey, don't get her wrong. It's just... She loved daddy, and look where that got her. She got hurt. Georgey and Mary are dead. Gone. No more. And Annie's sad. She doesn't show it, but Kitty can tell her role model is sad. Why, she doesn't know. It's just a sister hunch.

And of course, when you're four, and scared, one of the worst things that can happen to you is a nightmare.

Kitty is back to that night. Her, Georgey, Annie, and daddy walk into the door, the last of them looking extremely tired. Yet daddy had one of those mischievous looks on his face, like Annie when she's about to pop out from the corner to scare Georgey.

After locking the door, he turns to the three of them, and asks for their attention.

"Would you all like to play a game?" Kitty finds herself saying yes with her other two siblings, even though she knows what happens next. She doesn't want to relive it, so why can't she just wake up? "Whoever I catch first will be the special guest in my room tonight."

"Okay! Let's play!" Kitty wants to beg Annie and Georgey to say no. She wants to see something different, she doesn't want to go. She just wants to leave and wake up! Crawl into Annie's bed because she knows that the green girl will protect her.

"3...2...1...Go!" Kitty runs as fast as she can because maybe if she runs fast enough she won't get caught this time. But she's still little, and Annie and Georgey are much faster than her, so even with the head start, she's still the first one caught. She's still the 'special guest'. She still has to go into his room.

When he grabs hold of her, both of them are laughing, because it felt like it was just fun and normal at first. But knowing what happens next, Kitty feels sick. Like she's about to throw up. But it's still a dream so she doesn't.

Daddy takes her hand and leads her up the stairs. When it happened the first time, Kitty didn't know what to expect, and followed like a good girl. Now as she's revisiting the memory in an unwanted nightmare, she feels like she's being dragged like a doll.

"We're going to have some....special playtime." And when it comes time to their 'special playtime' that's all she feels like. A lifeless doll, nothing but a plaything.

Daddy walks towards her and moves his hands along Kitty's sides. Kitty flinches and wiggles, trying to escape, to no avail. His hands lower and then they're touching in between her legs and she doesn't like it.

She can't figure out how to speak in the heat of the moment, so she does the next best thing. Scream. Scream at the top of her lungs because she's crying now and daddy doesn't care. She's shaking her head and he doesn't care. He keeps touching her and she hates it. She hates it!

Kitty hopes her screams are loud enough, but a louder noise cuts her off. The gunshot. Georgey is standing in the hallway, right in front of the open door. Her only brother. Covered in a red that stains his shirt, and makes him fall to the floor with a thud.

And not long after Mary follows suit, the red spilling all over the floor. And then the gun is pointed at someone else in this nightmare. Annie. This time daddy's about to shoot Annie. 

Kitty wants to run over and save her but she can't move. She's stuck in place and forced to watch as another bang goes off....

And she wakes up. She wakes up. God, thank you that she's awake again. The moon is still in the sky, but all Kitty wants is to make sure that Annie is still alive. That when the bang went off, it didn't release any blood.

Annie ends up stirring awake as well when her younger sister pounces on the bed, the stuffed kitten (which she had named Pinky) in her hands. Unfortunately for her, there's no way that Kitty is going to let her sleep after the nightmare she had.

So both of them end up staying awake until it's _reasonable_ for them to be awake on a Saturday morning. Which is normally seven/eight, simply because they get more time to play that way.

Their lack of sleep doesn't go unnoticed by the adults. CathCath knows what it feels like first hand, and Gracey has seen the behavior from her best friend, a lot.

"Girls, did something happen? You both look exhausted."

"Kitty had a nightmare and wouldn't let me sleep." Annie tells, her skepticism of the adults having lowered a lot more since the trial. Kitty doesn't say anything, of course, the foster parents don't expect her to, just squeezes Annie's hand tightly. Notably tighter than usual.

"Anne, why don't you and Kitty go back upstairs and sleep? You-"

"NO!" Kitty interrupts. She can't sleep. If she sleeps, she might not wake up again. And Annie is all that she has left. "Annie no sleep!"

"Kitty, darling, take a look, you're sister looks extremely tired and you do t-"

"NO! NO! Annie. Gun. Red." The youngest child's breathing quickens, the words being broken apart and said in between these breaths. "Daddy. Touch. Say. No. Stop. Gun. Blood. Dead. Touch." She starts to rock herself back and forth, searching for something to ground herself to.

It's a different type of panic attack for her. Or, at least, Annie doesn't know how to handle it, and she's getting a bit worried as well. Not to mention the other foster kids.

CathCath tries to put some of the pieces together, but with how broken apart the words are, it proves to be a bit more difficult. She remembers what Annie had told her about what happened and why they were there, but the one thing is that she simply wasn't there.

There were bound to be some events that Annie couldn't witness because of the lack of her presence. And unfortunately, Kitty was a major part in those events. So that would have to be the reason.

"Kitty..." Gracey tries to slowly inch her hand towards Kitty's but the latter flinches.

"NO! DON'T TOUCH!" Gracey retracts her hand, knowing better than to push on. 

"Okay...shhh...we're not going to touch you. But can you breathe with us? In....out....in....out.....there, that's good. Keep going. In...." Although Kitty is still extremely cautious around CathCath and Gracey, she can ground herself in the latter's voice. She tries her best to copy their actions, but her breath still shakes.

"Annie stay." The pink girl clutches the green girl's arm, again, as if she'll disappear and never come back if she leaves now. "Not Georgey and Mary..." Her voice is barely above a whisper, so quiet that the last sentence is barely caught by the others.

Annie doesn't understand at first because why would Kitty be talking about Georgey and Mary? Unless... Does she think....that she's going to die if she leaves?

"It's alright Kitty. You and Annie are both safe. Nothing is going to happen to either of you." It seems that CathCath has also come to that conclusion as she's the one to speak next. "And I'm sure you're scared, but, it would help if you could tell us what happened. Or, at least something we can avoiding doing to not make you uncomfortable?"

The youngest child looks up with teary eyes. Her grip doesn't loosen on her older sister, but she sniffs and nods. The thought of even thinking about what happened that night makes her uneasy, but if she does it now, she won't have to ever again.

Or, at least that's how it was with Annie. But if it happened to Annie, then surely it'll happen to her. Annie is her sister, so it has to work like that.

"D-daddy s-said special p-p-playtime... Daddy touch me... I say no... Daddy s-still t-t-touch me... I scream... G-gun... B-b-blood... Annie..." Even though the sentences are short, it's the most that Kitty's spoken so far.

Whether that streak will continue, is uncertain. But CathCath and Gracey will hope for her continuous healing. Or, at least, they hope that it's healing in the first place.

"....I don't get it...." The German girl quietly says, followed by mutter agreements from the blonde and the Spanish. Looks like they forgot that _everyone_ is present in the room. Upon realizing this, Kitty attempts to hide herself, crawling into Annie's lap and curling into her.

"You don't have to right now. What matters is that Anne and Kitty are calm and okay. Alright." Gracey saves the situation. The trio feels a bit conflicted at the response, but the girl in black's reasons were simply that they've had a lot to deal with, and Kitty's situation is a big one to handle, even for adults.

Annie, like CathCath, feels disgusted, putting the pieces together in her head. It makes sense to her, that the others are confused. They don't exactly know the story, and how terrible a person Annie's step-dad turned out to be. The seven year old is glad that he's now long gone forever and ever.

Though, CathCath and Gracey know that forever and ever isn't the case, unfortunately. The sentence he'd been given was not one for life, the case not mentioning anything about Kitty being possibly molested. 

But that _is_ a long ways away from now, and Annie and Kitty are in CathCath and Gracey's custody. They won't see him for the near future.

"I'm calm now. Tank you mama CathCath. Tank you mummy Gracey." Everyone's eyes flicker with shock. Not only did Kitty speak in what seems to be full, not intentionally shortened, sentences, she just referred to the oldest two of the house as mama and mummy.

Even Lina, who had been there the longest, didn't do that. Yet here's this young child, clearly traumatized, referring to her guardians as her parents. Whether that's a matter of her age, or personality, or just plain coincidence, will remain unsure.

The blue and black-clothed girls are _clearly_ not used to being called mama and mummy, their faces showing what they can't say. But whatever that face was, it's replaced with smiles. Smiles from all the girls.

And Kitty's is the biggest of them all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i swear i feel like i'm getting a bit repetitive and it's not okay, i am SO sorry
> 
> also here's me looking at the list of fics i wanna start reading.....but me telling myself to finish the darn chapter before reading cuz otherwise i'll feel unproductive....  
> yeah that's what i've been up to, but enough about me, how's everyone else? HAPPY NEW YEAR


	10. Happy Birthday Anne!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's Anne's birthday!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yall ready for a fluff fest?
> 
> and guess what i was actually keeping track of what days of the week everything was on, but now i lost track so that's not happening anymore, we just gonna randomly pick now

It's at this moment Anne realizes that _she_ is, in fact, the oldest child of the house. _Not_ Catalina. The corners of her lips turn upward into a smirk when she looks at the calendar, ultimately noticing the 26th of October is in a week.

And realizing that although Lina has lived here the longest, she's no longer in charge. Everyone knows that the oldest is always, _always_ , in charge. And Lina's not the oldest, she is.

"You're not older than me, we're the same age!" Lina retorts. The children in green, gold, and silver, are playing a board game at the table, the pink and red over in the living room watching TV.

"Nuh uh. Not in a week." Jane tilts her head at the point Anne makes. The latter clearly notices this, as she elaborates on what she means. "My birthday's in a week. So _I'll_ be 8 and _you'll_ be 7, meaning, I'm the oldest and I'm now in charge!"

The explanation wasn't made to anyone in particular, but if anyone knows these two, they know that the following comment is made towards Lina. Their relationship will never be quite similar to one, say, like Anna and Kitty, but the two are still good friends. 

Just friends who like to bicker and push each others buttons frequently. It's all in good nature though, no crossing boundaries. They make certain of that.

"That's not how it works! I'm in charge!"

"The oldest is in charge!" Jane taps the others' shoulders, nodding towards the door, where Cathy stands.

"You know, if the oldest is in charge, then technically all of you need to listen to me." There's a few seconds of silence that Cathy smirks at. "Of course, you need to be listening to Grace and I anyway. We're in charge, now clean up and get ready, we're going to the park, remember?"

The children's eyes light up at the reminder, quickly putting away the board pieces. The blue girl is thankful for their banter though, because through it, she's able to remind Grace about some gift buying to do.

* * *

Kitty comes along with Cathy when she goes gift shopping. The four year old isn't complaining, she's just a bit worried that she hasn't come up with an idea for Anne's birthday gift. 

Her new sisters have already told Cathy what they plan to get (hence the shopping trip), and they haven't known Anne for that long. Anne is Kitty's _real_ sister and it's wrong that she doesn't have a birthday present for her yet.

But it's when they're walking through one of the aisles that something catches Kitty's eye.

The pink girl tugs on Cathy's sleeve, her eyes not darting away to other items. Although Kitty is now comfortable with everyone at the house, she's still transitioning back into speaking fully again.

"Buy for Annie please?"

"You think she's gonna like that?" Kitty shakes her head at this.

"I make something for her." The writer smiles at the foster child's thoughtfulness, grabbing the item off the shelf and placing it in the cart. Kitty doesn't speak the rest of the trip, but it's nothing bad, the gears are simply just turning in her head at record speed.

This doesn't bother Cathy, but she hopes she can clean up the inevitable mess before Grace gets home.

* * *

When it comes down to birthday activities, everyone in the house expects Anne to want to have a big party or something of the sort. To their surprise, Anne simply requests that everyone stay at home, or something more low scale.

The others' curiosity increases, Grace then being the one to proceed and ask their question.

"Anne? Are you sure you don't want a party, like we did for Anna and Jane?" The receiver of the question nods, this being a decision she's made since she's decided to trust everyone.

"When my mom was still alive, my step-dad made me wear these big dresses for big parties with big bullies who I didn't know or like. But mostly, someone was always never there. It was never all of us. And that's what I really wanted..."

Anna purses her lips at this, remembering the only other major attempt her papa tried to get rid of her... She shudders at the thought, hoping that no one else sees (they don't).

Other than that the reaction is pretty unanimous. Not to mention it's Anne's birthday, so everyone is content with completing her request (yes, even Lina).

Anne wouldn't be surprised if it ended up not happening, as this promise has been broken multiple times with her birth family. But seeing all the things Cathy, Grace, and the others do for them, she wouldn't be surprised if they followed through either.

* * *

In this case, it's the latter. Anne's birthday lands on a Tuesday, the busiest day of the week for the foster family, yet everyone makes efforts to skip activities, push back work, etc, just for her.

Naturally, she feels a slight pang of guilt, but it's quickly ignored and pushed aside, on account of her excitement, and just her personality in general. She actually doesn't mind going to school on her birthday, she quite likes it in a way.

Of course, the beginning of her official celebration (in other words, at home) is spent flaunting her age and new title of 'oldest child'. Some bantering inevitably occurs, but that's just routine at this point.

The rest of the day is spent as their family of seven, regular family games (meaning the kids dragging Cathy and Grace into their sometimes scarily creative imaginations), dinner, family movie. 

It's nothing new, but Anne can't ask for anything else. She hadn't trusted them at first, her heart still clinging to what her family used to be, but she's so glad she did. This unlikely family has shown her so much love, respect, boundaries, just to an extent she simply hadn't felt before.

Don't get her wrong, her mother as well as Mary and George did love her. But they always had 'other priorities' and 'excuses' so it was barely ever an entire family dinner, much less having all of them for holidays and birthdays.

Here, everyone does so much to make sure that each one of them is appreciated, loved, and cared for, Cathy and Grace overseeing a lot of it. That's something Anne really _really_ appreciates about her new family.

And Anne could _never_ forget about Kitty. Her baby sister is, basically speaking, the light of her world. And vice versa for Kitty. The four year old has made sure that Anne won't forget how much she looks up to her.

Kitty's present is the last one for Anne to open, admittedly, because the former forgot to bring it downstairs. But after running around the house searching for it, and finding the gift hidden carefully under her bed, she carefully walks down. Her arms are far out in front of her, and her gaze is trained on the ground, making her she doesn't slip and fall.

When she gets into the living room, where everyone was waiting, she turns around and walks backward, not wanting to hold her gift behind her back. Grace stands up and guides (with Kitty's permission, of course) her back to her spot beside her role model.

With a big grin on her face, Kitty hands her present to Anne. The latter's eyes light up at the sight.

The part that's clearly Kitty's doing is the picture frame. It's covered with tons and tons of green glitter. There's some pink heart stickers on the corners as well, the top stickers with more glitter, and the bottom ones have little smiley faces on them.

The picture inside is one of just Kitty and Anne. It's a picture of one time when Kitty and Anne were cuddled up on the couch, for no apparent reason at all, just feeling it. Cathy had come over to them and asked to take their picture. For no particular reason, but neither of them seemed to mind, so they smiled a 'picture smile'.

But then Kitty hiccuped with a funny noise, and both of them started laughing. In the frozen picture their smiles are genuine, and Kitty's eyes are squinted so much they seem to have disappeared.

Going back to Anne's gift, the final 'Kitty touch' what Anne makes out as 'I LovE yoU' in what's probably pink glitter glue. The eight year old's smile grows from ear to ear.

She turns towards her baby sister, who gives her a smile that almost mimics the one in the photo. Being careful not to damage the gift, Anne wraps her arms around Kitty.

"I love you too." Is what she whispers into her ear.

Best birthday ever?

That's an understatement.

_Happy birthday Anne!_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ok so basically we're taking a break from new characters and i'll be posting a bunch of fluff chapters for a bit.  
> i did ask my good friend @insanity_times_ten what they thought, but i wanted to double check
> 
> so would you rather i post just bday chapters (end up being five fluff chapters) or bday AND holidays (nine chapters) before i introduce the next child?


	11. Halloween/Thanksgiving!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Happy Halloween/Thanksgiving!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yo yo yo we're going chronological through the year until the next child......which comes in may, spoiler alert.  
> hence the survey last chapter. there will be more fluff scattered in between after the next child, it's just a matter of what comes next chronologically (i actually have a list of the things lol)  
> but enough of that enjoy some badly written fluff (fluff is hard, okay?)

Obviously, the children would never forget something as important as Halloween. The fact that Anne's birthday was just five days prior changed their priorities a little bit. 

And if there already wasn't a sugar high from said birthday, there definitely will be after receiving tons of free candy from the other houses in the neighborhood. If the birthday sugar high was hard, Halloween must be close to impossible to handle.

That's their problem though.

Right now, they need to focus on costumes! Five costumes, for five kids, who are five little angelic bundles of joy, yet also five little demonic mischief makers. Well, demonic might be going a bit too far, but you get the point.

It does take a bit to calm the children down, but once that's done, they're finally able to go inside the Halloween store.

The kids' eyes light up as they enter, their foster parents' hearts flushing at the sight. Guess this is what parenting does to you. Anne walks in front, unfortunately not paying attention to where she's stepping, therefore accidentally stepping on the floor pad. You know, the ones that trigger those Halloween decorations.

This particular decoration happens to look like a phantom/ghost/demon/dementor type thing. When Anne accidentally steps on its trigger pad, the monster jumps--or rather moves--in front of the kids, causing them to yelp out in fear.

Anne and Anna's expressions quickly turn from fear into amusement. Lina's a bit indifferent, having about the same reaction she would if Anne jumped out from behind a corner to scare her. Both Kitty and Jane end up hiding behind their guardians, clutching the fabric of their pants tightly.

"It's alright girls, it's just a decoration." Cathy assures with a chuckle. "Everything here is fake, so there's nothing to be afraid of."

"Ha! Says the girl who screamed with the kids." With that comment, Grace earns herself a smack on the head, causing laughter to emerge from the group. Well, in the case of the pink and silver girls, a quiet and somewhat forced laughter. "Come on, let's go."

"Janey." The blonde turns her attention towards the youngest child. "Can you hold my hand?" Jane smiles, and takes the four year old's hand in hers. Kitty makes sure to stick close to Jane as they walk further into the store.

Per their request, the group quickly makes their way over to the costumes, Grace having to promise Lina, Anne, and Anna they'd look at the decorations later.

Anne almost immediately goes to the superhero section. One of her friends at school is really into this show, and Anne has recently gotten into it because of that. Although, she didn't get far by herself before the rest of her unlikely family joined in. She-ra is a pretty diverse show, some of the topics stirring up some questions that Cathy and Grace were happy to answer. But back to costume searching; it takes a bit, but Anne finally finds her new costume.

Lina doesn't go searching at first. Halloween has never been one of her favorite holidays, her old family never really celebrated it. So she doesn't exactly see the big fuss. But, with some convincing, Grace eventually tells her to go look for one as well. 'Well, no better time to start than with your sisters' is what she tells her. The golden girl follows Anna, not finding much appeal in any of the costumes. Lina shrugs at Grace and gives up. The latter does not, thinking of a different idea...

Jane has a bit of trouble deciding on a costume. Disney? Animal? The amount of choices only confuses the seven year old--so many things, and yet you can only be one. Yes, there's always next year, but next year you'll be older and you'll like different things so you'll want to wear something else and then you'll never get to wear the other options from this year. But then, she comes to a medium. Toothless is one of her favorite characters after all.

Anna also has a set destination. She looks around the costumes that aren't necessarily directed towards a gender. Wizard, bat, spider, etc. Call her simple if you want, but it's a thing that she and her friends are planning to do for their dress-up day at school. 

Halloween falls on a Sunday, which is fun, but they won't get to wear their costumes to school like Anne talked about. So, her teacher, Mr. Burr, convinced the other kindergarten teachers to let them dress up on Monday. Word got around and now it's a school-wide thing.

Anna looks through her options one more time, trying to remember what her friends said they were planning to wear so she doesn't copy them. Finally, she settles on the werewolf. 

Kitty waits for Jane to pick her costume before looking for hers. Although she's become more open with her family, she can feel the scary decorations staring at her, so she sticks close _just_ in case. By the time Jane is done, the others have picked their costumes. All that's left is Kitty. And so she runs over to, you guessed it, the princess section, the others following behind. 

The red girl hopes no one notices how tense she is at seeing where the pink girl goes. The sight of seeing all those girly, pretty dresses, she doesn't like it. Unfortunately for the red girl, they do notice; but not wanting to intrude in a public space, they keep silent.

That is, until Kitty returns to the group, holding a costume of her favorite princess, Rapunzel.

"Nana? Are you okay?" Giving up on trying to hide her tension, she just shakes her head, wiping away the almost-fallen tears.

"Why don't we pay now and go home? Is that alright Anna?" Cathy asks in the form of a question, but it's really more a statement of action. Either way, Anna nods and the group quickly makes their way to the counter to pay.

No one says a word, except for a couple of thank you's directed toward the cashier. Once inside the car, everyone buckles up, but Grace doesn't start the car right away.

"Es tut mir leid, dass wir nicht länger bleiben konnten..." Anna mutters. Everyone assumes she's just speaking to herself, but because of Grace's response, they realize she'd slipped into German.

"It's alright Anna. If you wanna talk about it, we'll listen. But if you don't, that's okay as well." The six year old purses her lips, both embarrassed to admit what's bothering her, and reluctant to go back to the memory in the first place.

"..Papa made me dress up in big fancy dresses and I didn't like it." Anna curls in on herself, Kitty leaning on her shoulder after she does so. "Mali told me he was gonna sell me to some guy, and he dressed me up all fancy and in white and lace and stuff. But then he didn't want me so now I'm here."

Cathy refrains from showing her disgust at what Anna's told them. No matter what her situation had been, it's revolting that someone would do something like that and clearly feel no remorse.

"Anna." Grace starts. "Thank you for telling us."

"I'm going to be honest here, I'm glad you're not over there anymore." Cathy's comment isn't taken personally, and rather cracks a smile onto Anna's face.

"Me too." 

Taking a full 180, the actual day of Halloween comes. And like every special day the kids wake up a lot earlier than necessary (according to Grace, but what does she know?). Though, this time Cathy hurdles them back to sleep so they don't fall asleep in the middle of trick-or-treating.

When it _is_ time to get up and dressed, the kids start to put on their costumes. Well, except Lina. Again, she doesn't have a costume and is quite indifferent about the holiday in general. So far... 

Grace pops into Lina's room before she starts getting dressed.

"Hold on. I have an idea." The girl in black looks through the gold girl's closet, picking a specific outfit for the seven year old to wear. "I know you're not into the costume thing yet, but I remember you said this outfit made you look like Mary Poppins." Lina tilts her head, still not knowing where this is going. "So, I thought you could wear this as a Mary Poppins 'costume', but it'll still look like normal clothes if you don't want to think of it that way."

"Oh. Okay." Lina still somewhat indifferent, but it couldn't hurt to at least do that. Plus, she likes the Mary Poppins movie.

First on their list is the mall, where they have a bunch of Halloween activities for the kids. Plus, early trick or treating, but thankfully the kids are too distracted to eat all of their candy.

When it's late enough, the group collects more candies around their neighborhood, bumping into Casa de la Chaos on the way. (Little do the kids know that this was just a _tiny_ bit staged. They're all really close after all)

Lina finds herself enjoying today. Quite honestly, she still doesn't see how some of these things are scary, but it's still pretty fun. Plus she finally got candy. So maybe she'll join in fully next year.

This year?

She doesn't remember.

But Cathy, Grace, Vicki, and Courtney clearly remember what will now be known as the Sugar High Race™. And they won't be forgetting it anytime soon.

_Happy Halloween!_

* * *

It shouldn't be surprising when the teacher assigns a thanksgiving project for the class.

"For this assignment I want you to think about what your parents do that you're thankful for." Is what they tell them. "You can write them a little message and draw a picture to go along with it." Is what they say. "Other directions are on your papers, any other questions?"

The kids don't say anything. And with that, the teacher sets them off to work. At first glance, everyone's easily coming up with things and writing them down, or drawing picture.

But within their respective classes a few certain foster kids do nothing. Just stare at their paper in confusion. This doesn't go unnoticed by their teachers, but since they have similar interactions, we'll focus on the 2nd grade classroom.

Collette, Lina and Anne send each other looks. Collette never even met her parents, Lina's parents are basically dead, and Anne's only living parent is in jail. So... how exactly do they do this?

"Are you okay?" Chloe, the other kid at their table, and friends with Anne, asks. Anne answers for them in the form of a nod, but unfortunately this answer doesn't satisfy her friend. "Is it because you're foster kids?" The question is asked quietly, to not draw attention to them, and again, it's technically a secret.

"Anne, how does she know?"

"Her mom works with Grace, how'd you not know?"

"Everything okay over here?" Ms. Schuyler walks over to the table, kneeling in the space between Anne and Chloe's seats. "What's up?" There's a moment of silence around the table until Chloe grows tired of it.

"They haven't done anything so I asked what's wrong." The adult nods in understanding, and offers a solution without explicitly stating what the real situation is.

"You know, I said parents, but you don't have to make it about or to your mom and dad. It could be to your aunt, your grandparents, your guardians?" Although Collette, Lina, and Anne don't know the actual meaning of the word, they've heard it thrown around at the agency. So by word association, she's saying they can make it about their foster parents.

Well, they haven't thought of that before. Parent is literally in the name how has it not crossed their minds? But now that the idea is planted in their brains...

"Thanksgiving is really about appreciating the special people in life, no matter who those people are. That can apply many ways, but I think you know how it works for you now." Ms. Schuyler gives them a wink before standing up and walking back to their desk.

This'll work great now.

The day of Thanksgiving is spent with just their little family in the house. It's at the dinner table that the children take out their drawings/letters, or whatever you'd like to call them, from school (When Kitty saw her sisters bring them home, she set to work and made one of her own as well). 

Kitty's drawing has very few words to follow, her writing skills very limited with age and the fact that she's in pre-school. The drawing itself is a family portrait. Kitty, Annie, Nana, Janey, Catti, mama CathCath, and mummy Gracey. Surrounding everyone is a big heart, with little hearts on the outside of it for decoration.

It's safe to say that the others' drawings are something along those lines as well, so here's what each of the other kids wrote to their foster parents.

Anne: _Thank you for being cool and nice and taking care of me and Kitty and everyone else. I'm glad I trusted you_

Jane: _Thank you for making me feel safe and for not getting mad at me when I make mistakes_

Anna: _Thank you for playing with me and loving me and my sisters a LOT :)_

Lina: _Thank you for paying attention to me and helping me be me and for being the best family and parents I could ask for_

Each one of the letters ends in an 'I love you', even Kitty's (written with the help of Anne). With each of the letters they read, Cathy and Grace's hearts become closer and closer to exploding of absolute pure adorableness.

"We love you girls too! We are so glad that we've decided to become foster parents,"

"And we're so glad you love being in our little family with us!" A burst of giggles pops up when Kitty starts blowing kisses to everyone at the table, and Anna following.

_Happy Thanksgiving!_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fluff and hurt/comfort will act as the same thing here and you can't tell me otherwise  
> and thanksgiving was a bit shorter cuz i didn't really know what else to do with it but yay hope u liked it


	12. Happy Birthday Lina!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's Lina's birthday!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi

It's about time. Anne will no longer be able to flaunt her age at Lina. That is, unless she plays the 'I'm older than you by two months' card. Which, in that case she hopes she doesn't.

(We all know she will)

"Linaaa!" The first foster child she's considered her sister run up to her and tackles her in a hug. The second grader, as usual, pretends to be annoyed, but loves the younger child's actions. "What do you want for your birthday?"

"It's your birthday?" Jane asks as she walks up to the others. While the kids wait at the pickup for Cathy and Grace's car, they continue the conversation at hand. "You didn't tell us that!"

"It's on December 16. Sadly, that means I won't be the only 8 year old now..." Anne's dramatics cause Lina to playfully shove her. Laughter emerges from the group, and continues as they catch sight of their car and hop in.

"Why are you laughing?" Kitty, who Cathy and Grace had picked up first, asks from her carseat.

"It's Lina's birthday and Anne's not the oldest anymore." Anna leans over from her seat behind her younger sister to answer the question. Though, this answer is quickly followed with a retort from Anne.

"Nuh uh! I said I'm not the only 8 year old! I'm still the oldest!" Anne's second sentence is sung in a sing-songy tone.

"Technically speaking, _I'm_ still the oldest, but have fun with your little quarrel." The kids give looks of confusion--they're not _that_ smart yet Cathy. "Never mind." She mutters, mostly to herself.

"Lina, have you thought of birthday activities?" The driver asks, pulling out of the school's lot and onto the main road. The almost-birthday girl thinks for a moment, this particular question having stumped her, despite having a lot of time prior to come up with an answer.

So she shrugs.

Looking out the window, Lina just aimlessly stares at whatever passes by. The grass, empty trees. It's December, and they haven't gotten any snow yet, it's kind of sad.

Wait... She'll ask them when they get home.

* * *

And that, friends, is how the foster family ends up at a ski resort for the weekend. When it comes down to it, Cathy, Anne, Kitty, and Lina know how to ski, Jane knows but prefers sledding, Anna doesn't know how so she wants to sled with Jane, and Grace just hates the cold.

That's all she told the girls, but since she can't leave Cathy alone to watch the five girls, so she reluctantly follows them out into the cold of winter.

The three non-skiers are originally left at the bottom, waiting a bit longer for the sled. As the other four come skiing down the hill, Anna and Jane watch them in awe. Jane was never that good at skiing, and Anna hasn't been skiing before, but one thing's for sure.

They wanna do it. But they also wanna sled. But it looks cool. But they don't wanna ask.

In that case, here's the plan. Sled for a bit--probably a lot, let's be honest. Try and get the others to sled with them. Then hopefully they won't laugh/get mad for asking for help.

When it's that part in the plan where they ask for help, the silver and red girls head towards Lina. Cathy's busy, Anne would probably make fun of them, Grace has been trying to get them inside but failing, and it'd be kind of embarrassing to ask Kitty since she's younger.

If they could they'd ask someone else since it's Lina's birthday. But alas, it just doesn't work like that.

Lina however knows they want something. She's learned, like most of them, how to read other people's emotions, what they're feeling, when not to be annoy or piss them off. If they got anything from their experiences, it's the empathy that their families lacked.

"Anna, Jane, are you okay?" The two girls' eyes widen, clearly not expecting to be found out. When no answer is said right away, Lina notices how their eyes glance and dart over to the skis/skiers. "Do you wanna ski with us? I'll teach you."

Almost immediately Jane and Anna shake their heads.

"No no no it's your birthday! You shouldn't be teaching us! We'll just ask Cathy-" The blonde starts to pull her junior over, but is stopped by her older sister.

"No. I'm your older sister and I want to teach you so you can come with us." At first, the two are simply in disbelief--Lina couldn't _actually_ wanna teach on her _birthday_. Then it goes to, what if she just feels like she has to because she's the oldest? (Well, second oldest, but still)

But whatever the case is, the birthday girl gives them a smile that shows that she really hopes they accept. And so they do.

Lina ends up dragging Anne into it because teaching your sisters how to ski is a lot harder than it sounds. And of course, where Anne is, Kitty is too, so she took on the role of showing them what it's supposed to look like.

(No one tell the kids, but Cathy and Grace find this moment so adorable, they take out their phones and start filming it. They'll have to show Vicki and Courtney later--and hopefully not the kids because _that_ would get them in trouble with their own foster kids.)

Jane and Anna don't make it to the top this time, but they still have fun learning and eventually going down the hill with the rest of their family--except Grace, who _still_ hates the cold and wants to go inside.

When they finally do retire for the day ("It's about time!" Grace had exclaimed), each child gets a cup of hot chocolate, the adults getting coffee. Though, the girl in black makes sure the Cathy's _actually_ drinking hot chocolate like the kids. The girl's got enough caffeine in her system anyway.

Normally, Lina's somewhat against cuddling in public, but this time, she doesn't resist or move when Jane and Anna press themselves into both sides of her.

"Danke Lina." Anna's taught her family some common German phrases, so Lina's able to quickly translate this to 'thanks'.

"You're welcome."

Kitty then catches sight of the group hug, and being cuddle kitten she is, hops--well, walks, since hopping would make her cocoa spill--over to their spot and finds a spot to curl into. Even Anne heads over to hug the birthday girl.

Lina doesn't really need it to be all about her on her birthday. It's nice, but seeing the others happy makes her happiest.

_Happy Birthday Lina!_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi we're skipping the holiday chapters now and only doing bdays bc fluff is hard and i rlly wanna get to the next big chapter heheheeheh
> 
> and wow this was short, i will try and make the next one longer


	13. Happy Birthday Cathy!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's Cathy's birthday!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> m o r e b i r t h d a y s  
> lol

The holidays, exclude the unlikeliness of their little-big family, were spent just like any other celebration. Like any other family, if you think about it. Everyone had a lot of fun, Casa de la Chaos came over, it was great.

But this.... this is different.

The month is now March, and there aren't any big holidays like Valentine's Day, or Christmas, or Halloween. If this were any other family, a day like this wouldn't necessarily stir up this much hype. In the Parr/Mouat household (a nickname has yet to be established), the anticipation is through the roof.

Because Cathy's birthday is this month.

And because it's this month, the kids want to work their hardest to throw Cathy the best birthday ever! And what is the best type of party? A surprise party. None of the kids have actually _had_ a surprise party, but it's obviously the best.

Everyone talks about how great they are. You see them in stories and in movies and tv shows and a bunch of other things. Cathy obviously deserves the best birthday.

So everyday after school--Kitty basically forced them not to plan without her--the kids will group together in one of their rooms and prepare their surprise birthday party for Cathy.

Of course Cathy notices things, and she knows when those troublemakers are scheming. One or two days straight after school could simply be them being excited for a game. But one week? And each time they tried to skip their homework.

Cathy's expecting something big. And hopefully it isn't another series of pranks. 

Second week of March, and Cathy's birthday is in five days. Time to drag in the big.....people. Let's avoid try to avoid those triggers, shall we?

When they arrive home after another day of school, Lina, Anne, and Jane drag Grace aside, while Anna and Kitty drag Cathy into the living room as a distraction. If Cathy's being honest, she's just a tiny bit scared of what might happen during this time. Hopefully it'll be over and Grace won't be involved in this.

"Grace, we need your help." Grace hums in question, knowing this was coming based on the looks they gave her in the car. "We wanna have a surprise birthday party for Cathy." The foster parent's heart almost melts--that's what they were planning.

"Of course, when do you wanna buy things, or do you need me for something else?" Jane and Anne give each other a look before presenting a piece of paper each. "Oh, you have a list."

"Yup! Jane's is a list of things we need to buy, and mine is map of where you need to go when you distract Cathy." Grace raises an eyebrow.

" _I'm_ distracting Cathy? Shouldn't I be helping you decorate?" The children roll their eyes at the question.

"Me and Anne are old enough! It's not like we're using the stove." The adult doesn't know which is worse, leaving them decorate by themselves, or the fact that using the stove by themselves has crossed their minds. _Lina's_ mind to be precise.

But, she does find it cute at their determination for this little sentiment. And creating this detailed of a plan is impressive, especially at their age. She just hopes they lay off the pranks after (who is she kidding though, April Fool's and Mayday are coming up in the following months. There's no way).

"Alright. I'll head to the store tomorrow. Let's do this kids."

* * *

As Grace leads Cathy out to their backyard, she practically prays that the children won't burn the house down. But she's probably overreacting, how do you burn the house down if you're just decorating?

"What's the date again?"

"March 19 but you don't need it! Just make it say 'Happy Birthday Cathy'."

"Catti help!"

"How'd you get tied up in the streamers?"

"Anne I can't reach!"

"Hold on!"

"Hurry!"

"Fine, you set the table!"

"Hurry up! Grace is about to come inside!"

Turns out decorating by yourselves is a lot harder than people make it seem. But hey, they have streamers, balloons (well, _a_ balloon, don't ask), a 'Happy Birthday' sign, and it's in Cathy's color--blue.

Now they just have to stand nicely, wait for Grace to bring Cathy into the living room, and hope that she likes it. Grace said that she's going to love it, even if it doesn't go perfectly to plan. Let's hope that she's right.

"Grace I swear to fucking god if you're helping the kids pull pranks-" The younger of the two shushes the older.

"I thought we got over the cussing? The girl's will hear you." When their presence is mentioned, the youngest two can't help but start giggling, only to be shushed by the older three.

"Surprise!!" The kids yell when Cathy enters the room, gesturing to all the work they did (Kitty is a second late, but that makes it all the more cute). The writer almost explodes at the thought that these foster children care enough about her that they did all this for her.

It's a lot to take in.

The pink girl looks at her older sister, wondering if she should do it now. The eager nods, and slight tap from Anne, are all Kitty needs to step forward and start talking.

"Tank you for loving us and being amazing and spe....specatular?" Kitty tries to say the word Cathy used for her drawing a while back, but apparently she said it wrong because Lina leans in and corrects her. "I mean spectacular!"

Cathy can't help but giggle a bit when Kitty mispronounces the word. Once Kitty is finished, she steps back and Anne steps forward. Are they all going to say a little bit?

"Thank you for spending time with us, and for standing up for me and Kitty when we went to trial. Because after you said that, the big person took step-dad away and let us stay with you." The blue girl notes that Anne's little bit is more specific than the little messages they'd received on Thanksgiving. She can't help but wonder if they're all going to be this specific.

When Anne steps back, Jane steps forward. She's a bit more nervous than the first two, but she's always been more shy than the other children.

"Thank you for helping us feel safe and for showing me that it's okay to ask for help. Thank you for helping us with the fight with Snitch," Everyone, except Kitty, who's luckily unaware of his existence, grimaces at that. "And for making me a part of your family and reminding us we're not orphans."

Lina nods with a lot of affirmation at that comment. Snitch doesn't know a thing. The silver girl then switches places with the red girl.

"Thank you for saving me from the tiny spaces, and for helping me with nightmares, and for playing with us, and for telling cool stories, and...." Anna tries to pick one more thing to tell Cathy. "And for telling Lina to be nice to me."

"That was Grace."

"Oh. Sorry."

Grace lets out a chuckle, finding it funny that Anna messed the two of them up for a second. Though either way, the outcome was the same, so it really doesn't matter. The children make one final switch, so that Lina steps forward.

"Thank you for helping me with my nightmare like Anna, and for helping me talk about what happened. Y gracias por hablar español para poder decirte cuando Grace roba nuestros dulces." Cathy lets out a laugh, being the only one who can understand what she'd said. "We love you so so much, and thank you for being a great mama to all of us!"

And now the kids turn around, putting on their party hats before walking up to their foster parents with two more hats.

"Happy birthday mama Cathy!" They all shout in unison.

Cathy covers her mouth, filled with happiness. She kneels down, opening her arms to which the kids pile in for a group hug. No one knows how long it lasts, but when they let go, the blue girl turns to the girl in black.

"How much of this was them?"

"All of it except buying the stuff and distracting you." Based on Cathy's face, Grace adds on. "I am not joking, you ask them."

"We did it all ourselves!" Cathy smiles, giving the girls one last group hug.

"It's amazing, and _specatular_." From the side, Kitty pouts a little, but it doesn't last long. "And thank you, for an amazing birthday--this just made my day. How'd we end up with such great kids?"

"You got lucky?" Lina suggests, half-jokingly.

"Is it the bestest birthday?" Anna gets all up in Cathy's face as she asks this, staring her down into giving an answer.

"The very bestest."

_Happy Birthday Cathy!_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> phew almost there, two more fluff chaps


	14. Casa De La Chaos: Happy Birthday CJ!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's Cherelle's (CJ's) birthday!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thought i'd give casa de la chaos a little chap

CJ's been in Casa De La Chaos for seven months now. Basically the same amount of time as Anne and Kitty. Life here's pretty good. Better than the orphanage.

You know, you'd expect that they'd move all of the orphans into another orphanage, but apparently the one CJ was in was the last one. Any others would've been too far, so the agency had them all placed into foster homes instead.

She doesn't remember her parents. Similar to Collette's situation, she's been without her parents for as long as she can remember. Except, Collette's parents were presumed alive, where CJ's were presumed dead.

And she's never had to move. Orphanage kids stay there unless someone adopts them, which isn't often. CJ knows that orphans are different than foster kids. Apparently some kids don't.

Even the kids third grade and older hate Snitch. But for them, it's _actually_ his older brother. They refer to him as Rat, and unfortunately he's in Jen's class this year. (You will often hear Jen complaining about how lucky CJ and Collette are that they don't have either of them in their classes)

Actually, CJ will normally only hear stories about the things that they've done, the third graders' schedule never coinciding with the second or fourth graders. But the keyword here is: normally.

CJ's birthday week, which is supposed to be really fun based on what Vicki and Courtney tell her, just _has_ to be ruined by one of the brothers.

"Stop following me!" CJ had been waiting at the pickup area when she hears her older sister's voice. Turning her head, she sees Jen covering up her ears and briskly walking away from.....Rat.

"Come on! I just wanna know why you're an orphan now. It's an easy question!" The black-haired girl walks up to the two and, her intentions innocent, makes a remark.

"She's not an orphan, she's a foster kid." Jen is about the only one who's explicitly stated to her class that she's a foster kid. Well, it wasn't this year, but it happened and people are aware of that fact. Long story short, CJ's glad she isn't crossing privacy boundaries.

"They're the same thing." Collette, Lina, and Anne just so happen to walk out at this moment. And since the other three are standing relatively in front of the door, they're bound to see this interaction.

"No they're not. Foster kids aren't orphans." Lina notably clenches her fist at the word and comparison. The brothers are too much alike.

"And how do _you_ know? It's not like you're one of them." CJ's eyes widen and is about to say something before Jen grabs her and Collette.

"Our ride is here. Goodbye Rat." The oldest growls as she drags her younger sisters to the car. Vicki's eyes widen from her spot in the driver's seat when she sees her foster kids' faces. But before she can ask, "Can we go now?" Jen's tone asks her not to. At least not now.

When they get to the house, Jen quickly asks CJ to tell Vicki what happened before storming off into her room. Collette waits for a second, but when she receives a nod from the foster parent, she heads over to the table.

"So Jen's mad." CJ hums in response, following Vicki into the living room after taking off her shoes. "And I'm assuming you were there." CJ nods. "Don't tell me it's Snitch, because Collette's been really annoyed with that." The nine year old shakes her head.

"It's Rat." The adult rolls her eyes--she should've known since it involved Jen, that it'd be the other brother. "He kept asking Jen why she's an orphan. I told him that orphans are different than foster kids."

Vicki pinches the bridge of her nose. Of all things, the orphan situation had to be brought up once again. That must be why Collette also seemed a bit off as well.

"Well, thank you CJ for reminding him, but I don't think give them any attention. That's what they're really after anyway."

"But he kept following her and wouldn't leave her alone."

"....In that case I'll ask Courtney, but don't worry about him or his brother, okay?" The teal girl doesn't miss the beat before the nod. "Is everything alright Cher? I'm sorry this had to happen during your birthday week."

"Do I belong here?" The blonde's eyes widen.

"What do you mean?"

"Rat said I'm not one of them." Right from the words 'Rat said', Vicki starts shaking her head. Those two can and will not be trusted around here. 

"Hush that little mouth of yours." CJ purses her lips, not really knowing what else to do. The older of the two pulls the younger into her lap (with permission of course). "Now listen, both Rat and Snitch may know you, but they don't _know_ you."

"Huh?"

"Point is, don't listen to them because they don't know what your life is like. You belong here 100%. No matter what anyone tells you, you should be here, and we want you here. Did _that_ make more sense?"

CJ nods, hugging her foster parent.

"Thanks Vicki."

* * *

Her birthday starts like any other. With waking up early, waking up your sisters, then scaring your parents awake. It's a great way to start the day, honestly.

Before they do _anything_ however, Collette makes sure her younger-older sister gets the card they made.

> Love you CJ! Thanks for sticking up for Jen and me even thought you're really shy. --Coley
> 
> Hey, I'm sure you don't really wanna remember, but thanks for the other day. I'm really really happy you're my sister (between us, I like you better because you're not as annoying as Coley) Love you! --Jen
> 
> Thanks for sticking with us, Miss Cherelle CJ Jay. We love having you here and we can't wait to spend more time with you! We love you! --Vicki and Courtney

And really that's her favorite part of today. Everything else is nice, but having a family is something she's dreamt about.

Now she's 100% sure she has one.

_Happy birthday CJ!_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wow i wasn't kidding when i said little rip


	15. Happy Birthday Grace!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's Grace's birthday!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> last chap before the next child!

Like for Cathy's birthday, the kids wanna go BIG! But they also have to be original in whatever they choose. It can't just be a copy of Cathy's birthday because she'd be expecting that. Plus, that would make Cathy's previous birthday less special.

So the one thing we're going to focus on in their plans today, is their collectively large present. They still wanna give all of their thanks to Grace specifically, but doing another speech is repetitive, as they already did that for Cathy's birthday. Plus, it's kinda boring.

They keep their present in Lina's room and split up working on it this time. Anne suggested this so that the adults won't know they're planning something. Very tactical.

Except that Cathy walked into the yellow room while they were working on it. The current sections being worked on are Anna's, Jane's and Anne's. Lina's at a friend's house for a school assignment (Anne's not in her group) and Kitty's taking a nap.

The kids _tried_ to cover what they were working on, but there's too much to be covered so they give up and return to their original positions.

"What is this?" Cathy asks, very much amused at what's in front of her. "Dear Grace," Anna leans forward, covering her section as that was the one being read out loud.

"No."

"Is this Grace's birthday present?" The red, silver, and green kids exchange looks around the circle before the oldest of them sighs. No point in trying to hide it, since Cathy's like insanely smart.

"Yes...but you can't say _anything_ to her." When the blue girl raises an eyebrow, Anne squints her eyes. " _Anything_." She re-emphasizes, much slower than the first time.

"Don't worry, I promise I won't. Though, you girls are doing a much better job of hiding your scheme, we haven't suspected a thing." The oldest of the children nods proudly, Jane rolling her eyes off to the side.

"What was that for?"

"Nothing."

And yea.

* * *

They hadn't bothered trying to set up a surprise birthday party (that was a LOT of work that they would rather not repeat. Plus, Grace's birthday is May 12 so they don't have enough time to do all of their ~~scheming~~ planning).

Since Cathy despises driving so much, Grace _does_ end up having to drive to pick up her own cake, causing a little exchange happening right before she leaves the house.

"It's my birthday and I have to drive and pick up my own cake."

"I'm decorating and watching the kids."

"But It's Grace's birthday!"

"Not you girls too!"

But when she does come back, everything is ready and set, except for the children, who have seemingly disappeared. Before the birthday girl can ask, their foster kids come down the stairs holding something.

Well really, Anne, Lina, and Jane are the ones carrying it, Anna and Kitty are walking in front thinking they're carrying it. Grace and Cathy wonder why they need to carry it all together, until they see the sheer amount of art supplies taped and glued to the paper.

And glitter. So much glitter.

Of course this would happen, why did they not expect this?

Lina stands in the middle to hold it up since she's the tallest, with Jane and Anne on either side, and Anna and Kitty seated on the floor. Their gift appears to be a rather large birthday card in the form of a cupcake.

There's a lot going on, so both adults kneel in front, the two youngest eagerly pointing out different parts of it.

> Thanks for helping me with the bullies and Snitch, for helping me not be jealous, and for everything! --Lina
> 
> Dear Grace, Danke, dass du mit mir Deutsch gesprochen hast, and for helping me talk (in English) --Anna <3 :)
> 
> Thank you for not getting mad when I make mistakes and telling me it's okay to make mistakes --Jane
> 
> Thanks for convincing me to open up and making time for all of us to spend together --Anne
> 
> thank u 4 --Kitty :3

In Kitty's case, she draws little doodles to show what she means: pancakes, car, Pinky (Anne also added a label that says "for making playtime fun"). Kitty's section is the one with the most hearts and glitter (though that was completely expected of her).

And at the bottom of the poster/card, are the words 'Happy Birthday Mum Grace!' (there was a bit of a dispute between 'mum' and 'mummy' but they settled on 'mum').

"I _absolutely_ love it." Grace says, finally addressing all five of their foster kids. At the point the card is laid down on the floor as the others got tired of holding it up.

This makes for the perfect opportunity for a group hug, which, as usual, is very much taken.

"Mummy Gracey?" Hearing her nickname, the girl in black knows to turn to the youngest of them all. "How old _are_ you and mama CathCath?" The adults laugh at the question with such an innocent intention.

"Old enough." The writer starts with, but the answer doesn't seem to satisfy her, or any of the other girls--albeit Jane. "25." Eyes widen and jaws drop as the children start commenting their disbelief. Yes, another day and another celebration at their house.

Just Cathy, Grace, and their five foster children. Besides, it's not like they're going to get another kid dropped off at their door.

_Happy Birthday Grace!_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i swear i tried not to make it half-assed but then i made it half-assed and super short but hey this means we get to meet the first liw next chapter so yayyyyyy prepare urselves for some angst i mean whaaaaaaat

**Author's Note:**

> hope you enjoyed! any feedback is highly appreciated! if you have questions, i can answer those too!


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